BENGALURU :
Mumbai-based Macrotech Developers Ltd, which markets its properties under the Lodha brand, is looking to reduce debt to ₹10,000 crore by March 2022, through the sale of housing units, land and a rental office asset, Abhishek Lodha, managing director and chief executive, Lodha Group, said in an interview. Macrotech’s net debt for its India business is around ₹12,508 crore.
The developer clocked ₹3,450 crore in sales for the September quarter, including ₹2,003 crore from its India business, and ₹1,450 crore from two projects in London— Grosvenor Square and Lincoln Square.
Collections for the quarter stood at ₹1,912 crore.
The company, which listed on the stock exchange in April, is looking at pre-sales of ₹9,000 crore for 2021-22.
“The September quarter is seasonally weak for real estate. In that context, we have done very well. But like last year, 2021 is also a unique year. Collections follow sales, and so, after a disruption (like the second covid wave), collections get impacted. We have been on a debt reduction mode, and it will be done mostly through regular sales and the rest will be through sale of (non-core) assets like warehousing assets and commercial rental asset.”
Lodha said about ₹8,000 crore will come in from home sales and another ₹1,000 crore from asset monetization, which is expected to pick up in the second half of FY22.
The company’s debt, which stood at ₹16,076 crore as on 31 March 2021, was reduced by 23% to ₹12,435 crore at the end of the April-June quarter.
During the July-September period, Macrotech also closed a new joint development agreement in Mulund, in suburban Mumbai. Since April, it has signed five joint development agreements, in Mumbai Metropolitan Region and Pune, wherein the projects’ gross development value stands at ₹4,500 crore for an estimated saleable area of 4 million sq ft.
“Sales have been good across price points and the positive thing is, even our under-construction projects are selling well. We have a significant launch pipeline and plan to launch 4.5-5 million sq ft in the coming months. The projects will allow us to enter new micro-markets in MMR,” said Lodha.
Home sales in MMR in the January-August period have risen over three times to ₹1.33 trillion, according to a recent joint report by CREDAI-MCHI and CRE Matrix. During January-August 2020, MMR saw sales of ₹41,353 crore because of the adverse impact of covid.
“With the upcoming festive season, we are confident that we will see a huge increase in sales because consumers are keen to move into a bigger and better home,” he added.
Source: Live Mint