The National Real Estate Development Council (Naredco) has appealed to Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman to continue with the Special Window for Affordable and Mid Income Housing (SWAMIH) fund by launching the second edition with a corpus of ₹ 50,000 crore.
In a pre-budget memorandum to the finance minister, the council also wanted budgetary support and relaxations including allowing input tax credit under GST and incentives for rental housing to achieve the housing for all targets.
Noting that the SWAMIH fund has played a critical role and unlocked liquidity leading to renewed interest among investors, both foreign and domestic in the Indian real estate sector, the industry body has requested the government to create a second tranche of the SWAMIH fund.
As per industry estimates, in 2019, 90 per cent of the stalled projects were under the affordable and mid income segment, constituting about 1,509 housing projects comprising approximately 4.58 lakh housing units in the stalled category.
Revival of stalled projects was expected to lead to early completion and timely possession of homes for home buyers who have invested their hard-earned money.
The Special Window for Affordable and Mid-Income Housing (SWAMIH) Investment Fund I is a social impact fund specifically formed for completing stressed and stalled residential projects.
The Fund is sponsored by the Ministry of Finance, Government of India, and is managed by SBICAP Ventures Ltd., a State Bank Group company.
Since the Fund considers first-time developers, established developers withtroubled projects, developers with a poor track record of stalled projects, customer complaints and NPA accounts, and even projects where there are litigation issues, it is considered as the lender of last resort for distressed projects.
The Fund’s presence in a project often acts as a catalyst for better collections and sales primarily in projects that were delayed for years.
According to the Finance Ministry, SWAMIH Fund has one of the largest domestic real estate private equity teams focused only on funding and monitoring the completion of stressed housing projects.
