Piramal Finance eyes Rs 3,000-cr affordable housing deals

MUMBAI: Piramal Finance, a subsidiary of Piramal Enterprises, has set up a separate vertical to invest in affordable and mid-income residential projects in major metros across the country.

It has identified an initial pipeline of Rs 3,000 crore with transactions across the major metros and these are currently under active consideration.

“We now have a highly experienced team focused exclusively on scaling our presence within this segment and intend to scale up to $2 billion by 2020. Deals for around Rs 3,000 crore will be concluded over the next one year,” said Khushru Jijina, MD, Piramal Finance.


The targeted $2 billion worth of deals that would finance developers and their projects in this segment will include equity and structured debt.
The dedicated team will focus on pure and preferred equity transactions in affordable and mid-income housing projects on peripheral locations of Mumbai, NCR, Bengaluru, Pune, Chennai, Kolkata, Ahmedabad, Kolkata and Hyderabad.

Currently, it is in discussions with developers in peripheral locations of Mumbai, Bengaluru and Chennai. Jijina expects at least 2-3 deals to be concluded over the next three months.

In financial services, Piramal Enterprises provides comprehensive financing solutions to real estate companies. It has strategic alliances with global funds such as APG Asset Management, Bain Capital Credit, CPPIB Credit Investment Inc. and Ivanhoé Cambridge. Piramal Finance may also leverage its alliance with Ivanhoé Cambridge to achieve its target of scaling up the new offering.

“While many players in the market are focused on providing equity or debt capital towards affordable and mid income housing, we believe that our ability to provide a comprehensive end-to-end solution -- including both early stage equity as well as construction linked debt -- is truly unparalleled as it helps the developer achieve financial closure for the project on Day Zero,” said Jijina.