Flats without frills

Recession-hit builders in Bangalore are offering cash-strapped customers smaller complexes that are more efficient and utilitarian than fancy

Builders are coming up with recession-friendly homes for customers who can now only afford one-bedroom flats.
With luxury flats lying vacant and people occupying two- and three-bedroom flats moving to smaller ones, developers like Purvankara and Shobha are doing away with the frills and coming up with low-budget flats.

That's their way of beating the low liquidity factor and making the most of tax incentives for low-cost housing units.

Cutting down

Cynthia Dorrein, a graphic designer, says she was planning to buy a two-bedroom apartment. "But with nothing fitting our budget, we settled for a single-room complex which is spacious enough for two of us," she said.

"At one point, the single-bedroom flats were occupied by bachelors and techies staying away from home. But now, families are cramming themselves into single-room flats. So the best we can do is take advantage of the situation," says Anil Muthanna, a real estate agent.

No frills

Purvankara is coming up with two such projects, one of them taking off in August. "With demand for such units rising, developers are offering complexes that are more efficient and utilitarian than fancy. This means that common areas too will see a change, with facilities restricted to what's most sought after," said a Purvankara spokesperson.

Most of the flats in the market will soon be units that are nothing but studio apartments, compact in size, dispensing with all the frills and sometimes even standard features like balconies, said Bhushan Arun Patil, COO of My100floors, a real estate portal.

"Ranging from 600 to a maximum of 1,100 sq ft, these units are built to suit the basic requirements of a nuclear family," he said.