New Delhi, Aug 10 (IANS): As the property market has evolved significantly in the past few years with regulatory changes and wide acceptance of affordable housing, the average ticket price and size of properties in demand have declined during 2016-2021.

A report by Anarock Property Consultants said that the average ticket price of properties being launched now has reduced from Rs 68.20 lakh (during 2010-2015) to Rs 56.25 lakh (2016 to H1 2021). The increasing demand for affordable and mid segment homes has led this change, it said.

Further, the average size of homes has also reduced from 1,550 square feet in 2010-2015 to 1,250 per square feet between 2016 to the first half of 2021.

"While developers reduced home sizes to bring down prices, they will have to reconsider this aspect now -- there is increasing demand for bigger spaces to accommodate the WFH and e-schooling realities brought on by the pandemic," it said.

Further, on the trend in the realty market in the NCR, the Anarock report noted that from the glory days of local players between 2010 and 2015, the NCR housing market has been completely transformed in the period between 2016 and H1 2021.

A market once notorious for being driven by speculators, NCR was also a veritable hunting ground for unscrupulous developers churning out unchecked and unnecessary inventory, playing squarely to the speculator gallery, cashing in on the trust of unwitting homebuyers, and diverting their money elsewhere, it said.

"The aftermath of this period is still glaringly evident," says Anuj Puri, Chairman of Anarock Property Consultants.

"More than 3,28,600 homes are either terminally stalled or heavily delayed in NCR alone, accounting for 52 per cent of all such units across India's 7 major cities. Launched in 2014 or before, these projects are ugly testimony to NCR's darkest 'Wild West' years. Unregulated and unchecked, this market saw close to 2.58 lakh units unleashed between 2010 and 2015 by the leading 15 local players alone," Puri said.