There is lack of awareness about the new real estate law RERA among prospective home buyers and as high as 74 per cent of them do not know how to check whether builders' project are registered with the authority, according to a survey conducted by realty portal Magicbricks.
The Real Estate (Regulation & Development) Act, known as RERA, came into effect from May last year.
"Even a year after its implementation, RERA seems to be far from creating the connect as 74 per cent of home buyers still don't know how to check if their projects are registered under this Act," Magicbricks said in a statement.
The realty portal said that 15 states are yet to set up the online sites where developers can list their projects and consumers can check all information about the projects.
All states have adopted RERA and are in various stages of execution. So, in case a RERA portal is not functional, a home buyer can check with the RERA authority about the status of the project, it said.
If an under-construction project is not registered with the state's RERA authority, the consumer can make a complaint to the authority which then has to ensure that the project is registered.
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"States where the governments have been proactive and got the website and the machinery going have also seen a large number of consumers using it to check the legality of their project. However, since a large number of states are yet to get their act together, consumer awareness too is low," said E Jayashree Kurup, Head Editorial and Advice, Magicbricks.
Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh were the first states to be ready with the RERA authority and websites on May 1, 2017, when the law became a reality. Maharashtra's real estate developers are registering their projects with RERA authority websites and mentioning the registration number in their advertisements.