India needs infrastructure to support its development and perhaps this is the single largest factor that has been translating into a flourishing real estate market in India.

Owing to the healthy growth trends in the economy, quite a high demand is noticed in both the segments viz. commercial and residential, for the past many years. Besides, real estate has also emerged up as one of the most favorite investment options in India.

The burgeoning services sector in India spearheads the commercial real estate demand in the country. The Information Technology (IT) sector alone is expected to require 150 million sq. ft. of space to cater its operations across the country, by 2010.

Retailing is another major segment that is contributing to the real estate growth in India. The industry which is projected to grow by more than 25 per cent for the coming years is expected to create demand of whopping 220 million sq. ft. in the next 3-years. As per the reports, only 27 million sq. ft. is available for the industry at present and another 90 million sq. ft. will be added in year 2008.

More than 50 shopping malls with an average area of one-million sq. ft. are coming up at National Capital Region (NCR), Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai, Chandigarh, Ludhiana and Ahmedabad. The figures simply indicate towards the room available for growth for the real estate developers in India.

As the Indian middle class expands, the residential sector is also witnessing a spurt in demand. As per industry reports, there is a requirement of 19.4 million residential units in India at present and there exists huge opportunities for the real estate developers in the segment.

Rising levels of income and availability of home finance from financial institutions like HDFC, SBI, ICICI, etc also well supports housing needs of Indian masses. Nevertheless, the real estate developers have the gala time with more and more people intending to purchase their own houses.

The Indian real estate industry is maturing. Instead of being self-styled construction groups, companies are now adopting corporate style of management. They are also approaching capital markets to raise capital for financing their mega projects. Take DLF, Ansals, Parsvnath and Omaxe for instance who came up with their Initial Public Offering (IPO) while many more are in the pipeline.

Industry players are also tapping opportunities in the PPP (Public Private Participation) models with the government. After all, it is whopping USD 475 billion that is about to be infused in India into infrastructure development, in the next 5-years.

With a view to sustain its growth plans, the Indian government allows 100 per cent FDI in real estate projects. The foreign players like Signature from Dubai, Ayala from Philippines and many more from Malaysia followed by Britain, America, Israel and Singapore have been into plans to operate their projects in India.

According to the reports of a real estate consultancy firm Jones Lang LaSalle, a sizeable investment of USD 10 billion is likely to be pumped in into the Indian real estate markets in the next couple of years.