5 Reasons Why A Developer’s Reputation Matters While Buying A Home

India’s economy is once again on a sure footing, and people across the country are now confident about buying homes. Purchasing a home is of course a huge investment, and therefore not something where there can be any margin for error – and yet, things can and often do go wrong.

One of the most common mistakes that many buyers of property commit is doing business with developers who lack established credentials. Dealing only with reputed real estate builders is the first line of defence against getting cheated out of one’s money, and being assured of buying a quality product.

How can one identify reputable, reliable developers from the huge number of builders constantly putting projects on the market? There are several defining factors:

1. Legal Sanctity Of The Project

Every residential and commercial building needs to get a variety of permissions from local and government bodies. Reputed developers will ensure that their projects have all the certificates and permissions required by the local authorities. Again, their reputation is at stake and they will not take such matters lightly.

All instances of illegal construction that one reads of in the papers today have one factor in common – these projects are by unscrupulous or inexperienced builders who either did not care to get their projects properly approved, or did not know of all the approvals and permissions that they need to obtain.

2. Timely Completion

In most cases, developers will offer their projects for sale before it has actually been completed. On purchasing a home in an under-construction project, the buyer is assured of a certain time-frame in which possession will be given.

Reputed developers will not push the possession timeline beyond a rational limit, firstly because they are adequately funded and secondly because they will under no circumstances jeopardize their credibility on the market. Most of the instances of irrationally delayed project completions involve new, under-capitalized and often struggling builders. Reputed developers can and will always stick to the schedule.

3. Zero-defect Homes

For reputed developers, credibility is the key to their brand recognition – it is their primary competitive advantage in the market. They will never offer a homes that have construction defects like bad electrical fittings/wiring, faulty plumbing, water seepage, bad drainage, etc. Quality construction also includes the right size and shape of rooms that are in sync with the overall project design.

4. Project’s Structural Integrity

Quality control is an important part of every building construction being undertaken by a reputable developer. Their engineers will check and monitor every aspect of the construction process, including soil compactness, proper cement/sand ration, slump testing, drainage engineering and earthquake resistance of the building.

This ensures that the project will not suffer from construction-related defects in the future. Choice-based remodeling aside, buyers will not have to pay for structural repairs in the future.

5. Adequate Amenities

Reputed developers know that it takes more than four walls to make a home, and will always strive to offer a good lifestyle to their customers. They will always provide facilities like proper parking spaces, adequate security, internal access roads, playgrounds, clubhouses and aesthetically landscaped open spaces in their projects.

Fly-by-night developers, on the other hand, will look to provide only the barest essentials in order to keep their prices as low as possible, since their main aim is to attract non-discerning, budget-strung buyers who do not look beyond their financial restrictions.

It goes without saying that a home in a project by a reputable, credible developer will cost more than the threadbare offerings of anonymous local builders, but it is always worth it. If one chooses to patronize smaller, inexperienced developers, the only attraction will lie in the price – but the price one pays is actually much bigger than the one in the agreement.

Problems related to construction legality, lack of security and spurious engineering quality can result in massive future costs, and in the case of outright illegal buildings even a total financial loss The additional amount paid to a reputable, trustworthy developer is an investment one makes into security, peace of mind and a high-quality environment for the family.

Arvind Jain, Managing Director – Pride Group

The views expressed in this article are author´s own