Bad news for home-buyers in Mumbai! MHADA lottery to be delayed

The current lot of MHADA houses are at Goregaon, Sion and Powai. Representation Pic

There's bad news for home buyers - the housing lottery by the Maharashtra Housing and Development Authority (MHADA) will be delayed. This is because of the Real Estate Regulatory Act (RERA), 2016, which came into effect on May 1, under which all housing projects will now have to be registered.

Usually, MHADA's lottery is opened for citizen applications by the end of May. This year, while the buildings are ready, they will not be up for sale for at least two months, until the RERA registration is complete.

MHADA sources said the lottery will be announced for over 700 houses across the city for the economically weaker section, as well the lower, middle and higher income groups. An official said, "The houses are mainly in Goregaon and Sion, along with a few high income group houses in Powai."

RERA gives a 90-day window to developers to register their projects. This will include all new projects henceforth, as well as any existing and ready projects that have not received the Occupation Certificate yet. Subhash Lakhe, chief executive officer and vice-president of MHADA, said, "We conducted a workshop to explain the importance and mandates of the Real Estate Regulator Authority. We are in the midst of listing our properties that need to be registered and have instructed the engineers to do it on a war footing."

Meanwhile, with a lack of space in the city, MHADA has been struggling to maintain its housing stock. The number of homes to be auctioned have also decreased over the past few years. Last year, the authority had auctioned 972 houses, compared to 1,063 in 2015. The redevelopment policy decision for about 104 MHADA layouts has also been pending with the state government, thus leading a further hold up of the housing stock.

700 No. of houses to be auctioned