11.09 mn homes are lying vacant in India: Report

While the government is aiming to ensure Housing for All by 2022, millions of houses are lying vacant across the country. “India has nearly 11.09 million urban vacant housing units of which 10 states and Union Territories (UTs) contribute to 78% (8.64 million) of total vacancy levels,” according to a joint report, Institutionalising The Rental Housing Market In India -2019, by Knight Frank India, a real estate consultancy firm and Khaitan and Co., a law firm.

At 19%, Maharashtra has the highest number of vacant houses, followed by Gujarat with 11% and Uttar Pradesh with 9%. On the city level, millennium city Gurugram leads with 25.8% vacant houses, followed by Pune and Greater Mumbai with 21.70% and 15.30%, respectively.

According to Census 2011, out of 331 million houses in the country, 25 million were vacant. The highest number of vacancy was seen in Maharashtra with about 3.7 million vacant houses, followed by Uttar Pradesh with 2.4 million vacancies. The Census also indicates that above 95% of the houses surveyed were in a good and liveable state, and yet there were so many vacant houses.

According to the Knight Frank report, promoting and institutionalizing the rental housing market can reduce the number of vacant houses. However, that would need robust laws related to rental properties. “With the implementation of the ‘Draft Model Tenancy Act, 2019’, in the offing, the legal structure regulating landlord-tenant relationships and speedy adjudication of landlord-tenant disputes will provide for an efficient ecosystem for creation of a rental housing market in India,” stated the report.

Rental housing is also the need of the hour as more and more people, especially millennials, prefers to take property on rent, rather than buying it. “India’s growing millennial population and the expanding gig economy has created huge demand for shared rentals. For the millennial population, job mobility and location flexibility is the priority and home ownership is secondary,” said the report.