Covid-19 Is Changing How People Rent Apartments

Gargi Sarkar, 25, had been living in Mumbai for five years when the pandemic struck. In June, she decided to move back to Kolkata, giving up her one-bedroom home in suburban Andheri for which she and her roommate paid Rs 27,000 a month.“My office has switched to work from home since March and may continue till March next year,” said Gargi, a media professional. “My roommate lost her job due to Covid. It made sense that I move back home.”For Amitava Chakraborty, 35, the pandemic prompted a different change. He lived in a one-room studio in Mira Road, just outside Mumbai. “During the lockdown, my wife had a baby and we realised the space was too small,” he said. “Working from home became difficult in a small space.”Moving back to his home in West Bengal’s Hooghly district was not an option because of possible power cuts and slow internet connectivity. “When my agreement came up for renewal, I moved to a bigger one-bedroom apartment nearby.”Sarkar and Chakraborty symbolise the two trends in the nation’s rental housing market that the pandemic caused—vacancies rose as tenants left in a reverse migration, and demand for larger homes went up with people needing more space to work from home. That’s changing the mostly informal market for rental homes where, going by 2011 Census, more than a quarter of Indians lived. That share would have only grown since then as migration to cities in search for jobs accelerated in the past decade.Take Bengaluru, home to software services companies, for example. The city witnessed migration as companies switched to work from home during the lockdown. “We saw a lot of vacancies where unmarried people used to stay,” said Samir Arora, secretary, National Association of Realtors. Most of these places, he said, were either managed by companies or landlords who had converted them into co-living spaces.During the initial months of the lockdown when most offices switched to work from home, the rental market saw vacancies rise, putting pressure on rentals, according to data by NoBroker.in—a portal that connects landlords with tenants and potential buyers..But since then rentals have stabilised as demand for bigger rental homes also rose, according to brokers.Given the widespread work-from-home arrangements, a lot of young professionals are opting for slightly more affordable housing options, now that the proximity to workplace isn't a top priority, said Amit Wadhwani, managing director and co-founder, Sai Estate Consultants Chembur Pvt.Demand has gone up for homes in the suburbs and fallen near office complexes due to work from home, said Saurabh Garg, co-founder and chief business officer at NoBroker.in. “Post Covid, people prefer to be safe and not have too much offline interaction. So, they look at properties online and shortlist one-two matching their criteria and only visit those. They also choose online rent agreement and safe packers and movers on NoBroker.”Ramprasad Padhi, a Mumbai-based real estate adviser and founder of MumbaiProperties, said people with bigger families and children realised that it is not convenient for them to work effectively in smaller homes. “I have clients who have given on rent their existing apartments only to rent a bigger space for themselves.” There is a demand for quality spaces, he said, helping stabilise rentals.Multiliving, Mumbai-based real estate platform that helps tenants rent curated homes with a personal concierge and other added services, has started getting queries on larger spaces with dedicated studies and amenities near the house. “We did not get such questions earlier,” said Pankaj Singh, chief executive officer and founder. “Traction for our hospitality services (daily housekeeping, tech assisted concierge services which are contactless) has probably doubled in the last three-four months.”Bangalore, too, saw a surge in demand for homes in gated communities or villas. “People are tired of living in congested apartments because there are too many restrictions,” said Arora. “WFH has made people realise that they need more space for free movement and walking. People are ready to spend money on bigger homes with spaces for study areas.”Even home sales have picked up, more so in the festival season as buyers take benefit of record-low interest rates, relief in statutory levies and discounts by developers. According to the Anarock Research, the top seven cities are estimated to cumulatively see a 35% jump in housing sales in the ongoing festive quarter (October-December) compared with the preceding three months..Mumbai Residential Property Sales Up 36% In October: Knight Frank.A large chunk of this demand is coming from millennials, said Garg. “As they are expecting to spend a lot of time at home due to work from home, we see a massive behavior change towards exploring buying a house.”Something that’s also changing the rental market.

Covid-19 Is Changing How People Rent Apartments

How Covid-19 shaped India’s home rental market.

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