How Ready Are India's Buyers To Reap The Benefits RERA Offers?
Businesses are keeping rather busy these days to prepare themselves for the newly enacted real estate law. Authorities across India are also building frameworks in this regard as prospective buyers wait for the time to come when property purchases would stop being a hassle. There would be no fear of getting duped or taken for a ride. After all, the Real Estate (Regulation & Development) Act, 2016, will leave no scope for any wrongdoings. Fortunately, the provisions of the law do guarantee all of that. However, the success of the law does not get guaranteed only because businesses are preparing to make themselves compliant or authorities are setting up frameworks to deliver justice. A great deal of its success depends on how ready are buyers to reap the benefits offered by the revolutionary legislation. The knowledge that a law is there to safeguard buyers' interests is just not enough; buyers have to fully understand the law to benefit from it.
By the look of it, things are worked out in a such a way that real estate developers will be holding the key to its success—while they put their own act together, developers are also expected to ensure transparency without buyers having to worry about it altogether. This certainly makes developers more accountable but this also leaves a lot of scope for things going wrong. Without being fairly educated about their rights and duties, buyers will not be in a position to question. Even if something goes wrong, it may pass unnoticed. Simply put, we need aware buyers.
Unfortunately, not much has been done by the government so far to create awareness among prospective buyers about the law. While most of us know something revolutionary has happened for the real estate sector, not many of us are aware how does it change things for us. While the media might be working hard to break down the various provisions of the law for the common man, there are those who do not have access to this information either. And, then there are technology related hurdles, too.
“A large part of India's population has yet to reach online. They depend on traditional methods to carry out purchases across segments. Educating this population about the real estate law and enabling them to come online would be a challenge for the government,” says Ankit Mehra, a Delhi-based legal expert.
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