Customer satisfaction

The dictum of his business

A man on mission- Creating more opportunities and affordable houses, Mr. Nandakumar, Managing Director, Devinaryan Housing & Property Development Pvt. Ltd and President, CREDAI, Tamil Nadu and Chairman Committee on Affordable Housing - Credai National, CREDAI interacts exclusively with Built Expressions about real estate scenario, his plans for his firm and CREDAI.

"Be customer-centric," is what you get to acknowledge about while speaking to Mr. Nandakumar, Managing Director, Devinarayan Housing & Property Developments Pvt. Ltd and President, CREDAI, Tamil Nadu. His suggestions to developers on cost savings to customers are impeccable and he goes on to mention how adoption of newer technologies and opting green materials in housing projects help end users to save on cost. With an edge on the academic background of civil engineering and an experience as developer, Nandakumar knows subtleties of the market requirement. As per a market survey, about 65 percent of the demand comes from the affordable housing sector but, only five percent of it is being met. "We have to cash in on this opportunity. Adoption of latest technology can increase the mass production capabilities and integration of sustainable material can bring down the overall cost and downtime. Thereby we can offer units at a lower price in the stipulated time," he advises.

Avid interest in technology

To bring down the prices of units in a project or to make a project affordable, one cannot compromise on the quality. Yet, a developer can bring down the input cost and material cost thereby opting for newer technologies without finding the middle ground on the quality. "I travel extensively to learn about latest innovations in the materials housed in the construction sector. We are gathering information from various parts of the world, where certain materials are proven to be successful. For instance, we are in talks with a company from Singapore to bring composite structures to be used in our projects. Even high performance steel adds value by reducing on the foundation cost and if the import duties are brought down, it works out at 25 percent cheaper," he informs.

Devinarayan's Value System

Operating as a developer is a small format and high ticket business, he informs. There is a compulsion to be giving a personalized attention all the customers. Especially, in the budget housing segment, there is a need to be more explicit in their requirement. "We value our customer's requirement and meet their expectations in our projects. In fact, we are not into branding, the moment we sign up a property and start the construction process, we would finalise our customers," grins Nandakumar.  Nandakumar's firm, Devinarayan Housing & Property Developments was founded in 1990 and it has been developing premium residential projects across Chennai & Bengaluru. It consists of a team of experienced technocrat promoters, renowned industry consultants and a line-up of dedicated in-house professionals.

Certainly, a value system that speaks itself about the success of realty business and it's evident in Devinarayan Housing. With a dedicated Supervision team, Nandakumar has 40 dedicated and qualified engineers to translate thought process into delivery. "We have engineering presence in our thoughts and to delineate that in actual work and our each engineer in our team comes with 12 to 14 years of experience each," he adds.

Dwelling units with natural resources

For over the years, the focus at Devinarayan Housing has been on the niche up market segment where the format is small but the value is high. In this segment, the average price of the unit Devinarayan sells ranges from Rs. 6 crore to Rs. 7 crore. According to him, the significance and the requirement of this segment have gone up and however, acquiring property to build up market projects is not easy, he avers. As per a study, only 5 percent of the 65 percent of demand is being met by builders and with such a huge possibility, he aims to target that space. In the contemporary lifestyle, assisted living housing is catching in. This new vertical is gaining importance and Devinarayan’s first project in Coimbatore is in the drawing board stage, which will be rolled out by January 2014. "For such projects, location matters to a greater extent. We are looking for places that are away from urbanization and depending on how our first project in Coimbatore we like to reach out other cities as well," Nandakumar adds.

When inquired on Devinarayan Housing's signature projects, he says, "From the beginning, all our works have been a milestone projects. I never like to compromise on giving magnitude to natural factors available including lighting, ventilation, drainage system, ground water recharging and rain water harvesting. This USP is aiding us to be successful in this business. We just do not focus on giving a cosmetic glam to a project instead we offer as a sustainable product. We plan very meticulously before developing any project. Offering amenities is one area a builder has to be very careful. In thousands of apartments swimming pools and gyms are unused by the dwellers, hence, it’s imperative to plan amenities."

Real estate in Chennai

Despite few challenges of power, water and infrastructure challenges, Chennai has been steady in real estate development. The city has always been the safe zone as far as developers are concerned. "It has been a conservative market. When the entire country is making hue and cry about real estate prices going down, Chennai has been inert and insulate. Chennai is an alert place and never gone for adventurous things, the developers fail to recognize as a metro as compared to Bangalore. So we are not able to reach this level and the gap still exists and infrastructure is a challenge," he continues, "Everything lies at the hands of policy makers. Creation of values comes in depending on the policies. We need to synchronize the infrastructure, creation and development. Don’t allow any development of projects where infrastructure is not there. You need to synchronise the infrastructure provision, creation and then bring in development, then it becomes wholesome.  The basic necessities should be at a reachable point."

IT parks have been well accepted and successful in places such as Bangalore, Gurgoan and Pune where there is a concentration of IT hubs. However, Chennai has got the most unabsorbed IT parks. Nandakumar attributes the reason to the slowdown in the IT sector and he says, "IT parks built in Chennai are different than those of in Bangalore. The culture of integration of developers or tenants is required for such operations, which is currently absent in Chennai. IT is not seeing the finality in terms of its rebounding but, the scenario is slowly changing. However, we see opportunities in manufacturing and automobiles and in turn paving way to other ancillary units. Despite the power crisis we were able to bring in lot of investments last year."

Affordable housing is the next wave in real estate and Nandakumar aims to tap the opportunity. For his target of creating 25,000 affordable housing units by 2020, technology will be the key driver. Pioneering such initiatives in real estate is challenging and that’s because perceptions are different. To convince the users, you to demonstrate in reality that a particular technology works, he adds. Devinarayan presence will be beyond Chennai and Bangalore shortly. Coimbatore for assisted living and Madurai for integrated township will be company's next destinations.

CREDAI, avenue to bring transparency

Sustaining in real estate business is not only Nandakumar's motto but he believes in making a difference to this sector as well. That was evident when asked about his role as president, CREDAI, Tamil Nadu. His journey from Secretary, Chennai to Secretary, Tamil Nadu and finally as a President, Tamil Nadu, was an avenue and learning platform for him. "In fact, our CREDAI, Chennai was the first to moot out the code of conduct and consumer address for forum. Now, they have become nation-wide practice to bring in transparency in our work and such initiatives have strengthened further," he beams. He is also Chairman Committee on Affordable Housing - CREDAI, National.  With this role, he has taken country-wide responsibility of how to propagate the awareness among developers. Under his stewardship, CREDAI is trying to talk with government on how to create specialized residential zones only for affordable housing. "We have given lot of white papers trying to get fiscal benefits, wavier service tax and reduction on stamp duty. The objective is to bring about the value proposition to the customers. The more regulatory bills in turn trigger administrative cost which will proportionately pass on to the customers. We are trying to bring the government’s notice that umpteen regulations all stakeholders are complied, finally affecting the customers. However, it takes time but, perseverance pays," avers Nandakumar.

In addition, CREDAI wants to work with government to sensitize them on capability of what affordable housing can bring them in terms of the citizen satisfaction on particular governance under the partnership with developers. It is in talks with central government about specialized zones for developers for projects that have identical patterns and designs so that everybody gets equitable distribution of the work.

To bring transparency in real estate, role of CREDAI is very imperative and expanding its base across even tier II cities is required. As more developers join CREDAI, the level of transparency level increases. "Our maxim is to offer a compliant bound project to the customer, which I think we can bring through processes. We feel, people are very casual in their work so, we are trying to change the attitude and change the value system. We have to change the culture of 'I build my own way'. Ultimately, take CREDAI to smaller towns and bring them to our fold so that they are stimulated to grow well in more transparent and ethical manner," he adds.

Expanding CREDAI to overseas

Taking CREDAI as a brand outside the country is on the cards. FAIRPRO is an initiative from CREDAI, Tamil Nadu that examines a project through its legal cell and a technical cell. If the project is cleared through these cells, CREDAI certifies that project is in conformity with approvals. Nandakumar, says, "We create a roaster of projects and there will be no legal validation or due diligence of the projects. Everything is pre-validated. It saves lot of botheration in the customers mind. Such issues are very challenging for NRIs, so we assert and certify validity of such projects. Our ability to reach out to the target audience is much better than the commercial exhibition orgainised. In the first phase, it will be US then move to Middle East and Asia Pacific region."

With his two decades of real estate experience, Nandakumar observes that people who have come into this field over the last five to six years have tasted only the positive side of the story. They think it's going to remain the same throughout. He advises for new comers to be prepared for the flip side too, which is natural in any business operations. "One must understand that it's a pattern it takes to a peak, flattens and drops down and finally comes back. You need to tune yourself to be with that," adds Nandakumar.