In order to provide an impetus to affordable housing, a number of soaps have been announced in the Budget. Apart from higher ceiling limit in the exemption for rent, deduction on additional interest of Rs.50,000/- per annum has been provided to first-time buyers on loans of upto Rs.35 lakhs (where the cost of the house does not exceed Rs.50 lakhs). Even the service tax has been exempted for affordable housing. This is also likely to benefit NBFCs such as HDFC, CanFin Homes, Repco Home Finance, Gruh Finance etc that are present in the affordable home loan segment. It is a boost for house buyers and the builders can bargain and invite more people looking for affordable housing in a very big way.
S. Abhishek Ramaswamy
(The views expressed by the author in the article are his/her own.)
