Covering a wide spectrum of Indian sectors, the first Union Budget of Modi 3.0 focused on MSMEs, employment, skilling, youth, and the middle class. Yet, the Budget as such has failed to address several concerns of the real estate sector, including direct incentives to boost the affordable housing sector. It was widely anticipated that affordable housing will get a major boost in the current Budget because its performance has been on a decline.

With an eye on the housing needs of the urban poor and the middle class, the government has announced that it intends to construct an additional one crore homes under PMAY Urban 2.0 with an outlay of ₹10 lakh crore. It remains to be seen how effectively this would work for the benefit of those in the affordable housing segment.

Mega allocation for the Hyderabad-Bengaluru industrial corridor and Vizag-Chennai corridor will boost growth along these corridors and consequently boost real estate growth there. The Finance Minister also tried to rejuvenate the MSME (Ministry of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises) sector, which does have a multiplier effect on overall economic growth — with the implied positives for real estate being a collateral beneficiary of such growth.

The credit guarantee scheme for MSMEs will help provide impetus to overall industrial development, and this can have a rub-off effect on the real estate sector. The pandemic had a catastrophic impact on the MSME sector, which slowed down the demand for affordable housing from 2020. Affordable housing demand may gain momentum once the economic impact of the pandemic subsides for this target audience.

This is certainly pertinent — the affordable homes category (less than ₹40 lakh) has been seeing a decline in overall sales since the pandemic, to approximately 19% in H1 2024 from over 38% in the period before the pandemic in 2019. Consequently, this segment’s percentage share of the total housing supply in the top 7 cities also fell to 18% in H1 2024 from nearly 40% in 2019. Any boost to this vital segment is therefore welcome.

For individual taxpayers under the new tax regime, the increased standard deduction limit to ₹75,000 from the previous ₹50,000 along with the new income tax slabs implies savings, but hardly enough to boost housing demand.

With regards to the withdrawal of indexation benefits announced in the Budget, factors such as the amount of appreciation will determine whether the new tax (minus indexation) will be advantageous or disadvantageous for sellers. It is best to consult a tax expert for this, but as it seems now, when the difference between the purchase price and the sale price (in a 10-year period) is higher (say, more than 2-2.5 times), then the new tax regime without indexation is more lucrative for the buyers.

However, when the difference between the purchase price and sale price is lower, then the old tax regime with indexation is more lucrative for the buyers.

The writer is Chairman, ANAROCK Group.

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman with Union MoS for Finance Pankaj Chaudhary, Revenue Secretary Sanjay Malhotra and others during the 52nd Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council Meeting, in New Delhi, on October 7, 2023.
| Photo Credit: PTI

The Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council has decided to raise the maximum age limit for the president and members of the GST Appellate Tribunals, Finance and Corporate Affairs Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced after the 52nd Council meeting.

The president can have a tenure up to the age of 70, raised from 67 earlier, while the cap for members has been raised from 65 to 67. The minimum age of appointment, which was not specified earlier, is now recommended to be 50 years.

“We wanted it to be clear that advocates with up to ten years of experience must be minimum for consideration to become judicial members of the tribunals,” said Ms. Sitharaman.

The GST Council also decided that food preparations of millet flour in powder form, with at least 70% of the composition as millets in the blend, will have a 0% GST if sold loose or packed without any branding and labelling, and 5% only if sold pre-packaged and in a labelled form.

Taxing extra-neutral alcohol

Another critical decision taken that Ms. Sitharaman said would have major implications in Centre-State ties was that though the GST Council had, by law, the right to tax the extra-neutral alcohol (ENA), the Council has ceded that right to tax ENA to the States.

“It’s States’ decision now to tax it or not to,” she said. “This has been done in the interest of the States.”

The Allahabad High Court had earlier ruled that States had lost their competence to levy a tax on ENA.

The GST on molasses has been reduced from 28% to 5%, which the Minister said would benefit sugarcane farmers and will enable them to get paid faster from the sugar mills.

“We also believe that it will reduce the cost of cattle feed. The GST rate notification will be amended to create a new entry for extra-neutral alcohol for industrial use and that shall attract 18% tax,” she said.

On services, in order to promote tourism, the Council has given a conditional exemption to foreign-flag, foreign-going vessels, from the levy of Integrated GST, if they convert temporarily for a coastal run.

“In other words, for the next couple of months, in the winter, let’s say foreign run vessels do cruise tourism along India’s coast, we have decided to exempt them from 5% IGST normally levied. This will promote tourism particularly on the Western coast, from Mumbai to Kochi, and even the eastern coast,” said Ms. Sitharaman.