Gunjan Goel, Director, Goel Ganga Group 

All real estate cycles in India sooner or later will be compared to one particular region. No matter whether it is a large number of project approvals, big amount of institutional money flowing into the cities of Maharashtra or the level of regulations which other Indian states try to achieve,  Maharashtra  continues to lead the Indian real estate market.

Numbers Behind the Leadership Position

Numbers speak for themselves. MahaRERA has granted approval to 10,379 real estate projects in FY26- record number of annual approvals granted by the regulatory authority. Out of these approvals , as many as   4,204 were newly registered projects while the rest involved either  extensions or modifications to the existing projects. Not just the new projects entered the market , even the developers  became more accountable about their project deadlines. Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR) and Pune accounted for nearly 90% of all approvals, proving once again what the investors knew for a long time- the flow of investments into Maharashtra is concentrated in the limited number of corridors and these corridors become even more saturated.

Regulation System that bites
Maharahtra realty gets a leg up from a strong and well implemented RERA . MahaRERA was one of the first regulators to implement the RERA regulations with teeth and has only sharpened the bite. Escrow regulations, quarterly disclosure regulations, QR code based advertising which links directly to a project’s RERA status and a 60-day compensation SOP for buyer complaints are not mere window dressing. It reduces the informational gap between developer and consumer, and that, rather than any single infrastructure initiative, is what keeps institutional and retail money comfortably invested in the market.

Expanding  Infrastructure Making More micro-markets Viable
Infrastructure has its own story to tell. The expansion of the metro rail, coastal road and the Navi Mumbai International Airport are gradually making new micro-markets viable that could not have been thought a decade  ago. While Thane, Raigad and Palghar had earlier served as overflow markets for Mumbai, they are now being seen as stand-alone demand centres, considering  their RERA registration numbers . Meanwhile, Pune’s success stems from an altogether different but equally powerful source, a sustainable economy driven by IT and education.


The Friction Points
This, however, does not imply that there are no pain points in the market. There are indeed concerns of construction delays and slowing down of project completions and the lag between approvals and deliveries that MahaRERA itself is addressing by stringent checks on extensions. The question of affordability continues to be another challenge for the market as Maharashtra leads the nation in terms of median prices per square feet .The developers’ inclination towards launching premium/luxury projects over affordable ones is a trend worth watching , especially among first-time homebuyers who are getting pushed away from their affordability.

A Signalling Policy Decision
The fact that the state government is leaving the ready reckoner rates unchanged for FY27 is another small yet noteworthy signal. This implies that the aim of the policy decision was to retain momentum in transaction and preserve affordability instead of raising revenues while the market is already adjusting to price hikes in some important micro-markets. The falling collection of stamp duties in Mumbai despite higher unit sales implies a shift towards mid-value transactions.

Investment Rationale
For those contemplating how to allocate their investment dollars for Indian real estate over the coming years, the equation when it comes to Maharashtra hasn’t really changed. Rather it has just become more evidence based. A regulatory regime that enforces regulations rather than simply registering projects, an infrastructure regime that broadens the scope of available micro-markets on the map, and a state government that tailors policies to support rather than squeeze the market- all  put together make it a much stronger story than any individual statistic. Maharashtra’s success is not simply due to its size, but rather a result of years of consistent progress on regulation, infrastructure and policy front.