Property buyers who had paid stamp duty on or before March end are allowed to register their deals within a maximum window of four months until July 31 from the date of stamp duty payment. In December, the Maharashtra state government had offered this relaxation of four months in order to prevent crowding of registration offices.
In July, over 9,027 deals were registered in the country’s commercial capital, up 16% from 7,856 a month ago and a jump of 242% from 2,662 in July 2020, according to data from the Inspector General of Registration (IGR), Maharashtra.
The stamp duty collection in July has also risen to Rs 512 crore, up 23% from June’s Rs 420 crore collection. The collection has also surpassed the pre-pandemic performance of Rs 452 crore in June 2019.
“The government’s support with the stamp duty reduction offered has helped convert a lot of indecisive and first-time homebuyers. This has helped all the stakeholders including homebuyers and state government that has derived higher stamp duty revenue despite lower rates. We strongly request the government to reintroduce the stamp duty reduction to overcome the impact of Covid19 second wave,” said Sandeep Runwal, President-elect, NAREDCO.
This is the third month of robust growth in property registrations in Mumbai owing to the spill-over effect of the benefit of lower stamp duty that was offered until March end with a four-month relaxation to conclude the deal.
In May, the momentum in registration of property transactions in the city had started receding owing to the combination of lockdown and the government’s decision to withdraw the benefit of lower stamp duty. Interestingly, the government’s revenue collection had also fallen in May given the lower number of deals despite higher stamp duty rates.
After witnessing massive jump in sales and property registrations for seven months since September following the state government’s decision to reduce stamp duty, the registrations numbers in May had dwindled just one-third and one-fourth of levels seen in March and December, respectively.
With an objective of kick-starting the real estate sector and nearly 260 linked industries by encouraging housing sales, the state government had announced a reduction in stamp duty charges to 2% from 5% from September to December-end. Stamp duty was charged at 3% of the agreement value between January and March 31.
Several corporate personalities, business founders, industrialists, Bollywood actors including Amitabh Bachchan, Hrithik Roshan, Rani Mukherjee, Alia Bhat, Disha Patani, investment bankers and cricketers have bought luxury apartments and concluded their deals during this period.
