Hyderabad: Young home buyers drive into IT corridor

HYDERABAD: Not just IT employees, driving into Hyderabad's western corridor to buy a home now are dozens of buyers from other professions too - a trend not-so-apparent until a few years ago.

With a bulk of the city's new properties planned along the Hi Tec City-Kondapur-Gachibowli-Narsigi belt, customers are increasingly eyeing an apartment in these residential towers, even if their workplaces are on the other side of town. On the list of clients are pharma executives, bankers, doctors, entrepreneurs and even NRIs.
Reason for rush: Availability of gated communities and easy access to social infrastructure. Buyers also attribute it to better connectivity with the rest of the city, courtesy flyovers and metro.
Already sitting on a bulk of Hyderabad's residential supply, the western corridor is expected to add close to 30,000 more homes to its kitty over the next three years, show market records. Prices too are set to rise, marginally. But this is unlikely to dampen the momentum of sales, maintain industry analysts, while underlining a change in the age group of buyers as well - from the earlier bracket of 35 to 45 years, to 25 to 35 years now.
"When I initially moved to Hyderabad, I had bought a second-hand home in Begumpet because that was the epicentre. Now, with time, that's shifted to the western region and all our friends too have moved there. So, we decided to follow suit," said 34-year-old Priyank Tripati who recently bought a 2BHK in Nanakramguda. That commute to his office, in Somajiguda, has increased from 10 minutes to 45 minutes, isn't something the banker minds. Neither does Pravin Kumar, a marketing executive working out of an office in Ameerpet. He is waiting to move into his near-complete home in Financial District.
"Our consumer sentiment survey pointed out that at least 39% of all property seekers in Hyderabad are aged between 25 and 35 years group with fairly high disposable incomes. This is much higher than other cities," said Santhosh Kumar, vice-chairman, Anarock Property Consultants. "For instance, in MMR it is 16%, NCR 15%, Bengaluru 21% and Pune 28%," he added.
"Hyderabad has bucked the downtrend once in 2017 and it's the same story again amid Covid-19. While the prices have increased, the demand has still maintained pace. Post Covid-19, the focus has shifted to larger units, high-end/luxury homes, independent houses/villas as well as plots. Buyers sitting on the fence until now are leveraging the opportunity with lower interest rates and some discounts on offer," said Veera Babu, managing director, Cushman & Wakefield, Hyderabad