Raheja Revanta

Update February 8, 2012:

The prices for Tapas and Surya being offered by Raheja themselves in the primary market is now 5475 and 6475. Secondary market prices will not be available till the BBA’s are signed (my guess). So around April one should be able to start estimating secondary market prices.

Attached here is a map of the Metro network that will be coming on NH-8 right in front of the Raheja development.

Update 08 Nov 2011:

Apparently, the project is going to launch on 15th November 2011. Also, by push or pull, I think the 300/- prelaunch offer is still gettable, making it 4575/- psft for the low-rise Tapas townhouses.

The official site is rahejarevanta.com

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So, after my last Real Estate investment in 2006, described here, I am now back in the market and testing the waters again.

Me and a friend have each taken up a low-rise apartment in Tapas, in the development called Raheja Revanta in Sector 78 Gurgaon.

Location is as below:

Other pictures and material to be added soon…

If you would like to stay posted on this project and only if you are invested here, please send me an email at abyjain at hot mail dot com so that I can take your details on put you on the e-group for this project.

West Bengal, Mamati-di and NO-NO

So this whole Nano nautanki has been going on for a few days now and Tata’s have even asked the workers to stop reporting for work. Of course, these are high stakes games and one cannot predict how it will end and who will blink BUT …

However much you try reading in the mainstream media, there really isn’t any fair comment or on-the-ground news about what is right and wrong with both the sides. I’m a firm believer in “there’s another side to it” and I would like to know both. Also, knowing that Mamata is a politician and Tatas are Tatas, I tend to give the T’s the benefit of doubt.

At the end of the day, this fight against industry is NOT going to be very good for all these states. I understand that there might be genuine problems and there may be foul play by these very industries and the vested interest parties but why don’t we ever come up with an optimal solution?

Does anyone know of any articles or pieces available online which gives a fair picture of the situation on the ground in Singur?

Crying, whining investors in India

Mathematically if,

DD – domestic demand; FD – foreign demand; SP – stock price

then SP is in equilibrium with DD + FD.

SP = FD + DD (simplistically put)

When FD goes down, SP also has to go down unless DD makes up for it. But of course, we Indians are masters of “follow the leader” and when FD goes down, DD goes down by 1.5 times of FD. So what do we expect? Chidambaram should take care of the SP!!!! Crazy fools I say.

There are tons and tons of articles in the print media and on the TV about how families in Gujarat have been wiped out and how angry protestors outside the BSE were shouting slogans against the finance minister of India. I have a few points to raise to this:

a) When the Indian markets have been going through the roof for the past n number of months, how many of these protestors sent flowers or roses to the finance minister. Of course, none of these jokers was making money in the markets during all these days!! Most of the people I know closely are all still holding positive positions in their portfolios. So I would really like to meet the people who had a bad enough investment strategy to “wipe out their family” due to a correction which takes you back to levels seen just a few months ago.

b) Most sane investors would still have positive positions in the market if they have been investing regularly and not only in the last 6 months. The only real losers in the market today would be people who thought there was a quick and easy way to make money in the equity markets. These people were either leveraged (using money that was not theirs to risk) or foolhardy (jumping in just to make a killing). If these people do not understand that the markets follow a simple risk-reward philosophy then there is no one to be blamed.

c) Most of the stock prices will come back close to their earlier levels sooner or later. Investors who even invested at the lows of 22nd of January have also MADE a lot of money within this correction. The only stocks that will not come back to erstwhile levels are the ones where the most foolish people were treading. You cannot fault the SEBI or the finance ministry for that.

d) There is a lot of comment about how the FIIs come in to India, make money and leave! How crazy is that. If we used our own brains, and instead of selling stocks at moments like these, bought them and then sold them when the FIIs are back, then who would be the one making profit. We don’t lose money cos of the government or the FIIs, we lose it because we are following the FIIs in buying and selling instead of leading them.

I could go on and on, but the moot point is that the India story really is intact. Indian companies really are growing and no consumers income has gone down due to a stock market correction. Since all this demand is continuing to grow, Indian markets will keep growing. I would request our whining friends to stop making a political issue out of a worldwide correction and instead focus their attention on which are the right investment strategies for the future.

Edit:

US and Europe fell again after trading hours in India – Does this mean we’re in for another fall investing opportunity tomorrow?

Decoupling and all that!

Over the past few months, there has been a lot of talk about decoupling in the worlds economic markets and how Europe or China or India are not going to be affected as much when the US goes down.  And now, as the whole world catches a cold, there are more comments of how that is not true. To me, both of these versions are flawed. It is obvious that it is neither black nor white. Anyone in the world can not claim to be not affected when the US economy goes down, but, what we can definitely say is that businesses are on the whole far more “insured” today as compared to 10 years ago. On the one hand, every market in the world will swing wildly when the biggest FIIs start pulling money out of investments, but on the other hand companies (especially in India) will still march onwards to stellar growth and results. It is the panic of the domestic investor that is causing them to lose money. I’ll write more on that in another post, but basically my point is:

a) Decoupling is true, and more so for India than most others, in the sense that we are not so export-dependent as China. The biggest companies in the sensex will go on doing amazing business and keep growing in spite of what happens in the US. Of course there are some export oriented segments or US oriented companies which might suffer in the process. The fact that stock prices have gone down does not mean that the companies have just become unprofitable, or not-so-profitable or anything else. Its just a case of demand and supply of the shares – it’ll change again soon enough.

b) Decoupling is NOT true in the financial or equity markets. Today money flows almost freely from one country to another. But of course we are going to see a fall in Indian equities if the institutional investors are all pulling out money. Moreover, this decoupling will never happen and more in my next post.

Price of property is too high…. NOO..OOT

The price of property is just never high enough. In my short adult life, I have always thought that the price of property is just too high whenever you find something that you actually want. The first (out of 1.5) apartment I have ever bought was bought at a price of INR 1750 psft. This was to change to 1900 psft the next day itself. Whew, so thankfully I went ahead and booked it and closed that transaction. WOW, I look back at that transaction and wonder why I did not buy 5 of them then. It is another matter that I could not sleep that night and wondered if I had made the right decision. Today, from that price of 1750 in April 2004, the price is roughly 5000 psft. Thats a return of 185% profit in 4 years. And trust me, its not too good if compared to the peak performers.

Looking for property in Dubai, it is impossible to believe that there is nothing to buy that you think is wirth living in for less than INR 20000000, or about AED 2M. And that would be a 1 bedroom. Not so long ago, this was maybe 1M and people thought it was a bubble then!!!

Old age wisdom says – Property seldom lets you down. Of course there can be bubbles, and of course there can be wars or bomb blasts… but in the long run, or on an average – if you can qualify for a loan – then buy a property.

At the same time, unwise and purely speculative positions are something that I would now stay away from. As noted in my post earlier, TDI Kingsbury at Kundli seems right now to be quite an unwise move, especially considering they DID charge quite an amount for the vision they showed. Now god only knows where they will take us, or more importantly – WHEN!!

The falling dollar etc.

Originally uploaded by abyjain

The falling dollar seems to be doing a lot of good to a number of people. The most obvious are the students or tourists from India who have incomes in Rupees and need to spend in Dollars. Of course, the effect is more because of the falling dollar than the rising rupee. It is mighty interesting and convoluted the way the currency changes impact everything and it all keeps going round and round. From incoming Foreign investment to the competitiveness of Exports (Imports) and on to the long term impacts on all our living standards, these are definitely interesting times.

Some interesting articles on the fall of the dollar and the Chinese connection as well as some impact on India can be found on these links below…

From Oct 2007:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4186041

From Aug 2003:
http://www.globalpolicy.org/socecon/crisis/2003/07gpfdollar.htm

From Jan 2007:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/6195198.stm

From Oct 2007:
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/business/334575_dollaroutsource08.html

Indians can deposit $100,000 in banks abroad-Indians Abroad-The Times of India

Indians can deposit $100,000 in banks abroad-Indians Abroad-The Times of India

There is a story here, which commented on how the RBI hd no answer to the rising rupee… well, some people in government definitely do have brains. As per the story in the link above and here, the RBI does have some aces up its sleeve.

As usual… the post of relevance is above…. but this is very big news. Especially for people living in foreign lands who sometimes need money to invest which was till date not allowed under Indian laws. I don’t know if my interpretation is correct, but this measure could do a lot in controlling the value of the rupee cos there are a number of people who would want to invest rupees into dollars into investments outside of the country. Wow! Also, in one stroke it also takes care of a lot of hawala etc. kind of transactions and hence bring more money into the open…. nice move RBI. This is what a strong economy permits us to do…. we can get out of the vicious circles of stifling, killing controls and grey and black-market dealings into a strong and permissive system.

The thing is, for a lot of people, it seemed illogical not to be able to bring money from India when you’re living abroad and need money here. I obviously don’t know the details as of now… but it looks like a good move that regular people like you and me will be able to send a significant amount of money abroad every year and do whatever we see fit with it. Of course, it also takes care of the rupee rise whammy that we were talking about earlier. Hmmm…. things are looking up. I just hope the stock markets also stay up….

Update: I noticed 2 things later …. a) It is for resident Indians (which again means manipulating the system) and b) It has been notified originally since 2004… so why is it in the news now? Some changes?

Kingsbury by TDI at Kundli

EDIT 30th March 2012:

As usual, TDI keeps saying that delivery of the apartment will be within the next 3-6 months. The BIG scare that I got recently was that apparently the S block towers and the W block towers were under contention from the farmers etc and that work on these had stalled. Thankfully, having spoken to the TDI guys, I got to know that my particular tower, the W-6 is not under any such threat and it is some of the other towers. I feel bad about people who are going through this pain, because apparently after 6 years of making an investment, not only did TDI deliver no profits to its investors, they are now telling these particular owners that they have to shift to other apartments at the prices prevailing NOW. What a disgusting company and I wonder who would ever again invest with such people…

EDIT 1st Nov 2011:
Sorry for not updating and approving the comments for some time now. I have cleared most of the pending things. Also, I believe the latest is that TDI HAS finally been handing over the apartments in Kingsbury this year. My own apartment is still not handed over and I have some money that I need to pay to TDI.

Also, I had spoken to 2 brokers a couple of months ago. One of them said that you should be able to make 10-15 lakhs on the 3bhk after it is delivered and another said that since my building is one of the inner ones, I will not make any profit on it even after delivery.

What are your experiences, if any of you have sold or tried to sell?

EDIT 13th May 2010:

There is a group called TDIKAWA, which asks for membership fees etc. but promptly throws out a member of a bloody e-group as soon as I started asking questions about what they have done in the last one year in which they keep having meeting after meeting. Apparently, they decided that sending out an update email was leaking material to TDI. I cannot understand why the “TDI mole” cannot go to the meetings as well if it is important to them. The other thing is, if they did have a mole, it would probably be good for us as they would take us seriously if we were actually doing some damage to them. Just like a military dictatorship, these fools have actually thought that it is right to block someone from an e group because I had a dissenting tone. Even though half the members got there from this blog. Also, such rash behavior is probably not undertaken even by people of the Indian political system. I did not abuse, I did not threaten. Just cos I told them that they are all talk and no action, this joker of an owner of the e group actually banned me?!?! I’d advise anyone and everyone against giving any money to this residents welfare association till they can show what they have actually done beyond their adult game of meeting-meeting.

Edit on Jul 16, 2009:

There are a big number of people who are now getting together in Delhi contemplating legal and media based action against TDI for their behaviour and practises. Mostly, this has centred around the new and enhanced EDC being levied by TDI on customers who have already paid in full and been allotted as well as other customers who are feeling the pinch of firstly not getting anything at all in over three years and now bearing the brunt of more and more payments with no work to be seen almost.

I would request all investors of TDI to join this e-group mentioned in the post and comments of this blog entry. Together we can take a lot of action and media will also cover this if only they see the numbers and see the story in how the semi-reputed builders of this day and age are also fleecing customers. Look forward to some new folks joining the group and joining the action against TDI in Delhi.

The yahoo egroup is in the comments below.

Edit on Mar 10, 2009:

Just spoke to them again, and apparently for the 3BHK, Kingsbury, where I have the apartment, the allotment has STILL not reached 407 (my priority number). The thing is, we booked in APRIL 2006. We were made to pay again in JUNE 2007 by saying the allotment is coming up, even when the second payment was to be done ON ALLOTMENT. Since then, there is deathly silence except for new schemes all the time either trying to make you pay up in advance and being blackmailed into paying to get some allotment/possession/something.

The allotment apparently will still take “some time”.

The website, to which I am putting up some links below, actually talks about possession coming “soon” when I have not got a clue about allotment also. When I questioned the gentleman about it, he said yes, some possession is coming and it is for people who booked earlier than you. I mean, how much earlier could they have booked? 10 years before me? And I booked in original allotment with TDI directly!

Such brazen flouting of rules or principles should really be taken up by the authorities. Is there no one to oversee delivery and promise-keeping from these builders.

New pictures from the TDI website:

Edit on May 21, 2008:

Just spoke to the TDI Service Centre on 42166666. Point no. 1 – At least they talk politely and try to help. Of course, if there is nothing happening then no point blaming them for it or shouting on the staff… but they tell you what they can.

Updates:

1) Apparently the allotment for 3 BHK has happened till priority number 160. Mine is 407 so god knows when it will happen.

2) If you pay 90% of the amount, maybe also through the financing scheme in the comments below, then you can get immediate allotment.

3) Within 10-15 days of allotment, you will also have to pay the next installment which will be 277232.14/-

4) It is ABSOLUTELY SAD, but the pictures I have put up here on this blog are not of the apartment we seem to have bought as the woman told me that now “digging” is going on for the site!! Wonder what this building was on the TDI Site.

5) I remember when I had bought the house, it was supposed to be 1625 sqft. and now when I look at the receipt they sent me for the payments, it says 1400-1500 sqft. I had even confirmed with the contact centre very early on and they had said it was going to be 1625 sqft. Where did the amount in between go?

Seems like the place where me and my buddy invested in a flat finally seems to be taking off. It is really sad that we are not in India at the moment and I don’t know whats happening with the allotment of this flat. We really wanted to get in on an advatageous location within the complex. Perhaps overlooking the swimming pool 🙂

Anyway, a little bit happy that at least this work is happening –

Edit on 20th January 2008:

I guess all the optimism about something happening with TDI is waste. It has been almost 2 years since the booking investment was done and more installments have been paid since then. Had the same booking money been put with any of the other developers, it would have resulted in monetary gains for sure. This compares rather badly with the negative premium going on these TDI properties as far as I know. In any case, in two years, people usually develop and deliver the properties under construction. God help us!!!

Here is a link that usually has some activity on TDI properties -> TDI discussion forum