IOSR Journal of Business and Management (IOSR-JBM) e-ISSN: 2278-487X, p-ISSN: 2319-7668. Volume 20, Issue 7. Ver. V (July. 2018), PP 33-38 www.iosrjournals.org DOI: 10.9790/487X-2007053338 www.iosrjournals.org 33 | Page Analysis of Trends in Property Prices in Selected Indian Cities Angana Bhattacharya 1 , Dr. Sayantani Roy Choudhury 2 , Dr. Devleena Majumdar 3 1 Student, Amity University Kolkata 2 Assistant Professor of Economics, Amity University Kolkata 3 Assistant Professor of Economics, Amity University Kolkata Corresponding Author: Devleena Majumdar Abstract: The Indian real estate market is among the most recognised and fastest growing in the world. It is the second largest employer after agriculture and contributes to as much as 9% of the country’s total Gross Domestic Product. The paper compares the trends in average property prices of thirty-two localities across eight major Indian cities for the time periods 2016-17, 2013-14 and 2009-10. The 2016-2017 time-periods is then separately analysed since at that time GST was implemented. However, for 2016-17, no significant fluctuations has been found in the trend of prices. Therefore a regression analysis is conducted to see what factors may influence the average property prices in that time frame. The paper has found that the demand-side factors are more influential compared to that of supply-side factors. Finally, a study of the overall impact of GST shows how the cost of inputs into producing real estate have mostly fallen post-GST; home-buyers will be benefited more if they avail ready-to-move-in property than under-construction ones, and the position of affordable housing is better off as opposed to luxury housing under this regime. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date of Submission: 02-07-2018 Date of acceptance: 18-07-2018 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I. Introduction Real-estate market acts as an engine of economic growth for a country through its contribution in GDP, employment, overall aggregate demand and other macro economic variables. Similarly, purchase of property constitutes a major portion of the overall expenditure plans of buyers. The importance of a study stems from the fact real estate sector is among the highest revenue earning sectors of India and is expected to touch a growth rate of 30 % over the next decade. Nonetheless, other than all markets, real estate markets are fundamentally different in a sense that the values of properties vary widely across regions, and there are heterogeneous sets of factors in tern affects prices for those regions. There might not always be a general upward rising trend in property prices as a result of inflation and they may rather be subject to occasional arbitrary down or upswings due to several external and internal factors. Numerous factors could be responsible for such fluctuations in prices. However, in recent years, one of the most important factors could be introduction of the „Goods and Services Tax‟ (GST). The presence of a multitude of indirect taxes in India had made its financial environment sufficiently complex. It was a drive to ease this multiplicity and ambiguity in the taxation system that GST was implemented after the Constituent (One Hundred and First Amendment) Bill was passed by the Centre on July 1, 2017. GST subsumes approximately seventeen indirect taxes and is thus expected to bring about uniformity in the tax structure.1 In such way GST not only affects the sales of final property prices but also affects the prices of the inputs. For instance, inputs into the production of real estate are subject to varying GST rates. For the purpose of our study, we have considered three time-periods, since 20172 (mention three time periods)is expected to display a different scenario from the previous two time-periods with the objective to see the trends in property prices. Although the outcome will depend on how implementations GST indeed affected the input market. Nonetheless, other than governmental policies like GST, there are several factors which, in general, affect the prices of real estate. They comprise both demand side factors like growth rate of working force population, stamp duty rates, percentage of in-migrants, etc. and supply side factors like FDI in investment.(mention other variables) With this in mind the paper intends to observe, how implementation of GST affects real-estate prices or in other words, what overall impact has the implementation of GST brought about in the prices of real estate in 2017? The paper also tried to capture other economic factors that can also affect the real estate prices. Going by the objectives, the paper basically makes a comparative study of the 1 Stamp duty on property, however, still continues to be levied additionally 2 The year of GST‟s implementation