Neighbourhood of Whitefield

I had advertised for sale and rent of Villas in White field in the new supplement of TOI and had a lot of buyers calling and coming to see the advertised properties. Most of the prospective clients spoke about their requirements :

1. Accessibility - just off the main road, within few kms radius to major schools, work place, shopping
2. Good papers - well need to write another blog about A Khatha, B Khatha etc., :)
3. Good Amenities
4. If they decide to sell later - guarantee of good appreciation of the investment
5. if they decide to relocate good return on investment
6. good quality construction
7. lot of open spaces and wide roads inside the community
8. no noise, no pollution, should remain a gated community (well again is a gated community legal any longer? that needs a separate blog by itself :)

and last but not the least - the price - one crore to about 1.50 Cr

While respecting the requirements of the buyers, what i would like to explain here is the costing (which many feel/felt high considering some parameters not according to their requirements)

The land prices in Whitefield have shot up and Builders are buying land at the present high prices, and when they decide to develop, they have to leave a mandatory 45 to 50% as open spaces for roads, parks, amenities. So the land price which is already at a high becomes double. then comes the sanctions and infrastructure plus construction. These days the cost of materials have gone up so high and development costs have also become phenomenally expensive that a decent quality is nothing less than Rs.2000/= and land price not less than 3000 to 4000 per sft. Again land price is debatable but if the developer has to give a clear title with no violation in today's market the price of land per sft can not be less than 3500 to 4000 and if it is BDA approval you have to add another 500 rs or so.

Then comes the amenities part of it - Every one wants a Community Club house but what they don't realise is no community can run a club house exclusively for the residents alone and to sustain and balance the income and expenditure they have to open up the club house to outsiders and when you do that you are compromising on security - you are allowing more and more people into your property and increasing the risk of many strangers entering and while you can have a control over the vehicles by just giving stickers, what you dont realise is the drivers that come in and go and how much verification has been done on the staff that come with the car like care takes of children and drivers, etc., so is it better to take membership at a nearest club which is already existing or would you still want to have your own community club house, Again when you have your own club house what about the maintenance? the maintenance of the pool itself is quite high and with so much water shortage is it worth it to have a pool? and whether the water gets changed and cleaned as per the norms or to cut cost some compromise being done which poses a high risk of infection and diseases.

With so much labour problem, water shortage, high cost of living - shouldn't we be more conscious on what is important in terms of value based and environment friendly living? And having so much open space and greenery adds to more insects and mosquitoes and dengue is quietly taking away many lives the statistics of which is not really made public. while planting trees are very important i think having part of the space converted for outdoor games like tennis, foot ball, hockey, etc., is appreciable where the maintenance is not as high as maintenance of gardens. Plus we will also encourage the children to be outdoor and play outdoor games like in the olden days when we were happy to play cricket, Kho Kho, Gilli thandi as we would call it in tamil, and these outdoor games not just good for one's physical health but this also inspires a close community living and a healthy interaction amongst the kids.

Points to Ponder?!?