What are the common mistakes investors make?
People get emotional when it comes to selling property they always believe their holding is worth more than what the market dictates. Also, they rely excessively on the broker. This is understandable to an extent, since the developer offers all the good deals to institutions, but a value-for-money proposition calls for some research at the investor s end too. He must realise that the real estate market has a business cycle and he needs to buy and sell at troughs and peaks. Then there is the brokerage that increases the overall cost of the transaction, a factor many don t account for. Is India s real estate market very different from the UK s? The debt or the mortgage market in India is quite nascent. Also, the common man is left out of the best deals. Otherwise, both markets are similar in that residential property is not mainstream investing. And it cannot be because self-occupation, as against lease rental, is the primary motivation. The focus, in both countries, is on commercial and
