WANTED: A SMALL HOME!

IIPM set to beat economic slowdown

Love is strange. Time was when real estate biggies hated thinking ‘small’; now love for all things small is their only priority...

Dissuaded by the steep rise in home loan interest rates over the last one year, theatre actor Gauri Srivastava had been putting off the decision to buy her dream home for months. Complicating her decision were the bloated price tags that accompanied property prices in the National Capital Region and her fervent hope that prices will come down sooner than later. But, her home is not a distant dream anymore. Hoping to benefit from the government’s recent announcement of concessions for new home loans below Rs.20 lakh, a rash of private developers are busy launching new projects to cash in on the demand for ‘affordable housing’. Locations for these affordable homes may be a little far-flung (in places like Greater Noida, Faridabad, Karjat, Panvel, Indore, Raigarh and Sonepat), but like Gauri, thousands of consumers are finally heaving a sigh of relief; relishing the thought of soon moving into their own ‘small’ nest!

Asserts Jaipal Reddy, Union Minister for Urban Development, “There is immense demand in the small and mid- housing segment.” Omaxe, BPTP and DLF are a few among the big league of realty players who have set their sight on this new value-for-money game. If National Affordable Housing and Infrastructure (NAFIL)–Omaxe’s subsidiary company– has plans for properties in the sub-10 lakh range in Panvel, Indore, et al; Omaxe itself is finalising homes in the Rs.25 lakh bracket in locations like Greater Noida. BPTP, on its part, claims to be getting great responses for its affordable housing projects in Faridabad that again fall in the sub-20 lakh category. Even DLF is fine tuning ideas to launch housing for the masses believing that that indeed is the future to look forward to for Indian realty.

Affirms Rohtas Goel, CMD, Omaxe Developers, “Affordable housing is emerging as the best option for the developers in the present scenario,” obviously referring to the dying demand for luxury homes and penthouses, given the prevailing liquidity crunch in the economy. A big hurdle however is that in some cases realtors bought land at very steep prices when the sector was at its peak. Converting these into affordable housing projects may not be so easy. Sachin Sandhir, MD, RICS avers, “This would require a change in mindset for the developers. High land cost has been a major obstacle constituting up to 35% of project cost. Building affordable housing on these will reduce margins and affect viability of projects.” A reason perhaps that most of these new affordable projects are taking off in relatively less-prime locations. Also since large parcels of land (required for mass housing) are located mostly on city peripheries, connectivity and infrastructure support are a potential constraint.

Despite all hiccups however, industry insiders believe that the affordable housing segment is all set to grow phenomenally from hereon. “While housing sector leads the pack among all the realty segments, we have a strong belief that affordable housing will witness the highest interest among the investors,” explains Goel. So get set to see the roll-out of many more small and mid-segment homes soon. Hopefully, they will turn out to be the silver lining amidst the dark clouds hovering over Indian realty... For now, ‘small’ is in, at least for Gauri and her ilk!

Pawan Chabra

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Source : IIPM Editorial, 2009

An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri and Arindam chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

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NOW THAT’S A TOTALLY HATKE WAY TO CREATE A BRAND

1500-plus IIPM students placed across the country with 44 bagging international offers

WHEN NARSIMHAN WAS TOLD TO THINK DIFFERENTLY ABOUT VIRGIN MOBILE, LITTLE DID HE KNOW THAT EVERYTHING ABOUT IT WOULD BE IN HATKE ISHTYLE

“Our first offering & the competition is already seeing red,” was what Prasad Narsimhan had to say about the dramatic launch of Virgin Mobile in India. The CMO of the company couldn’t have asked for a better launch pad for the brand. Yelling & shrieking its arrival (literally!), Virgin Mobile on March 10, 2008, took the readers of a leading Indian English daily by surprise, when all the headlines on the first page were in the colour ‘red.’ What’s more? The ad became the talk of the town when as a new telecom company, Virgin Mobile announced a truly whacky scheme of paying its subscribers for all the incoming calls that they receive. Virgin Mobile was quick to realise that the desi lads and lassies love to talk for hours on their mobile, but have limited pocket money for the same. “The response to this scheme (paying 10 paise for every 60 seconds of incoming calls on the Virgin Mobile phone) has been overwhelming,” avers Narsimhan. A truly clutter-breaking strategy for Virgin Mobile, as the Indian telecom market already has 4-5 well-established players in each circle.

After the initial attack on other telecom players, Virgin Mobile did not sit back, rather it continued its lethal assault. With a host of telecom players slugging it out, Virgin Mobile knew it would have to take a hatke route, and here’s when the seeds were sowed to launch a mobile brand that revolves around the youth. “When we came in, the market was very competitive and others (competitors) were targeting almost everyone. That gave us the opportunity to think that can we look at only a part of the segment and delight them, rather than appeasing all,” explains Narasimhan. So, from day one, Virgin Mobile’s strategy has been to be ‘relevant to the youth’ in everything that it does. Rajeev Raja, ex-ECD of Bates 141 (the agency that handles the Virgin Mobile account) shares, “The brief given to the agency was simple – to launch a mobile for the youth.” So Virgin Mobile, within a span of just two weeks after the launch, brought out two very catchy TV commercials that instantly caught the eyeballs of their target audience – the Gen Y.

The rationale behind targeting youngsters was that in India, youth constitute a large chunk of the population. The challenge was to create a sharp brand entity in the minds of this target group. As many as 1,000 scripts were made around the ‘Think hatke’ theme and only 2-3 got selected to be made into TVCs. And undoubtedly Virgin Mobile’s TVCs are standing testimony of how to ‘Think hatke.’ That’s not all. The TVCs were backed by equally well chalked out outdoor and online campaigns; the places chosen are quite a hit with the Gen Y. The idea was not only to promote Virgin Mobile at these venues, but to develop long-term relationship with the youth. “Rather than deploying a carpet bombing strategy, the idea is to be where the youth is, like college campuses, movie halls, et al,” avers Narsimhan. So far, Virgin Mobile has got the right set of ingredients to break the clutter. Nevertheless, with other operators spending huge chunks of money to promote their VAS services, it would be interesting to see what Virgin Mobile plans to offer as it calls out loud, ‘Watch out for me!’

Surbhi Chawla

For more articles, Click on IIPM Article.

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2009

An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri and Arindam chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.
IIPM set to beat economic slowdown
IIPM Admission Detail
IIPM Programme :- SUPERIOR COURSE CONTENTS
IIPM INTERNATIONAL - NEW DELHI, GURGAON & NOIDA
IIPM - Admission Procedure
IIPM, GURGAON
IIPM : EXECUTIVE EDUCATION
Why Study Abroad When IIPM Gives You 3 global Advantages!