Women Driving Real Estate Market: 31% Invest, 69% Buy for Personal Use – ANAROCK Survey

Women in India are making independent decisions in the real estate market women are increasingly investing in properties. According to the ANAROCK Consumer Sentiment Survey, which is the latest release for H2 2024, 31% of women invest in real estate, whereas 69% buy for personal use. This trend underscores women’s increased financial autonomy and changing attitudes toward asset ownership.

Growing Preference for the Real Estate:

Real estate is the preferred investment option by women with 70 percent of respondents choosing it in H2 2024, compared to 65 percent in H2 2022 and 57 percent in H2 2019. Over the same period, interest in stock market investments among women fell sharply from over 20% to just 2% in H2 2024. “Given the huge drop in the stock market observed in the past few months, women have picked the winning ticket in terms of housing,” said Anuj Puri, Chairman of ANAROCK Group.

The only other asset class that is gaining momentum is gold, which doubled its popularity from 8% in H2 2022 to 12%+ in H2 2024. This shift reflects a cautious but strategic response by women investors in an era of market volatility.

It was the latest sign of the growing interest in premium and luxury homes.

One interesting tidbit from this survey: women show a particularly strong interest in premium and luxury homes. In H2 2024, a minimum of 52% of women respondents expressed a preference for properties priced above INR 90 lakhs, compared to 47% in H2 2022. One-third of prospective buyers are searching for homes in the INR 90 lakh to INR 1.5 crore price segment, while 11% are looking in the INR 1.5 to INR 2.5 crore bracket. Interestingly, as much as 8% of women respondents were looking at homes priced above INR 2.5 crore, indicating a surging of high net worth individuals (HNIs) in the Indian women segment.

Focus on Under-Construction Projects:

The preference for Newly launched properties is also on the rise, with the number of women respondents preferring new homes under construction in H2 2024 (18+) as in H2 2022 (10+). At the same time, the desire for ready-to-move-in homes has fallen from 48% to 29% in the same quarter. The trend indicates, however, an increasingly investment-oriented behaviour among women homebuyers, propelled by the reputation of large and often listed developers whose under-construction projects promise attractive returns.

This changing world order points to the increasing confidence and strategic investment approach of women in India’s real estate domain.