This edition of Forbes India explores everything from the developers creating those opulent homes to building the architectural and design features in these residencies.
The upward trend of premium real estate and equity prices, albeit not necessarily at the same rate, indicates a healthy economy. Among the more liquid investment options, stocks yield higher returns than other asset classes. This enables investors to partially book their profits and reinvest the excess into real estate.
Investors, especially the higher net-worth ones, would be inclined to take some profits off the table as the Sensex from 70,000 to 80,000 in just 58 trading sessions— the fastest 10,000-point gain in its history. A prudent use of those profits would be in luxury real estate, where many properties are available, from lavish apartments and penthouses in brand-new urban towers to villas and vacation homes outside major cities.
Property has seen a renaissance thanks to the rush of liquidity, especially at the upper end. This edition of Forbes India explores everything from the developers creating those opulent homes to designing the architectural and design features in these residences.
According to The Capgemini Research Institute’s 2024 World Wealth Report, there will be approximately 36 lakh high-net-worth individuals in India in 2023. According to the report, these people had net worths of at least $1 million (Rs 8.3 crore) and had an astounding $1,446 billion in wealth in 2023.
Moving up a notch, there were slightly more than 13,200 ultra HNIs (Indians with a net worth of at least $30 million, or roughly Rs250 crore) in 2023, according to Knight Frank’s 2024 Wealth Report. Due mainly to this extremely wealthy group, DLF, the most valuable developer in India, sold Rs 1,500 crore worth of ultra-luxury apartments in the fiscal year 2024.
Apartments in buildings such as Oberoi Realty’s 360 West in Mumbai can cost up to Rs 45 crores, as Samar Srivastava notes in ‘Homes That Last Generations’, page 44. The fact that buyers include billionaire Radhakrishnan Damani, the founder of DMart, and Bollywood star Shahid Kapoor is not surprising.
India’s financial capital is ranked eighth by Knight Frank’s Wealth Report for its price growth for luxury housing. Discover why by taking a laid-back, if slightly rushed, tour of this still-developing city. Chawls and slums are being replaced by ultramodern skyscrapers featuring multipurpose sports courts and reflexology gardens.
For this reason, Maximum City is an essential feature for any real estate developer worth their nine-hole putting (yes, it is included in the amenities package). The Menons, who are part of the Sobha Group, have become the third-biggest real estate group in Dubai, and are featured on the cover of Forbes India for this edition. The patriarch PNC Menon believes Sobha can make “about Rs 100,000 crore over 10 years” in the US, where the tour will next stop.
Then there is Mumbai, where Menon tells Manu Balachandran, the writer of the cover story, “We have to show something India has not seen.” Mumbai is the only city in India where we can repay the money we can afford to spend. Check out Balachandran’s “Brick by Brick” for additional information on the Mumbai— and the US—gambit.
This opulent real estate special offers a lot more. Mexy Xavier and Pankti Mehta visit the ultra-wealthy homes of India’s elite to seize elements that range from the conventional to the glitzy, which frequently mirror the characters of this fashionable group. Benu Joshi Routh also explores architecture and design revolutionizing the concept of luxury living.