How will RERA affect your brokers?
Maharashtra has recently notified rules for implementation of RERA and the real estate regulator in the state.
Broadly RERA across states, including the new RERA rules passed by Maharashtra, and even the central Act lay down the ground rules in which developers and homebuyers would interact in future.
The manner in which these two most important stakeholders would interact once RERA comes into force has been much talked about and discussed but the manner in which RERA will alter the way real estate agents function has not garnered much attention.
Like real developers and homebuyers, real estate agents too are an important and integral part of the real estate sector.
They provide the important link between the real estate developer and the homebuyer.
Even in the country’s largest real estate market—mumbai— real estate agents from the unorganised sector provide that most important link.
So how will the new RERA rules for Maharashtra alter the manner in which real estate agents operate and how does it
THE REAL ESTATE AGENT TILL NOW
While the broker provided the last mile connectivity to both the developer and the homebuyer, there are hardly any entry barriers to become a real estate agent. There are professional real estate agents that operate in the sector but a major part of the market is still dominated by real estate agents who are hardly trained to act in a professional manner Thus this section of the ism which to some extent leads to bad blood between the developers and the homebuyer.
This is a fact even in Mumbai, the largest real estate market in the country. In the present day real estate agents merely act as a facilitator between the buyer and a seller and refrain from providing a more advisory and consulting role. The new RERA rules for Maharashtra clearly lay down the ground rules within which real estate agents order to do this they will now have to function in a much more professional manner failing which they will be debarred from the sector.
THE WAY AHEAD
The new rules of the game for Maharashtra create filters that will ensure only serious real estate agents operate in the sector. This is largely in line with the central Act and RERA rules of other states like Delhi and Karnataka.
As per the new rules for Maharashtra no real estate agent shall operate within the sector without obtaining registration from the relevant authority. The developer, too, when providing disclosures to get his project registered with the relevant authority has to provide names of real estate that will be employed to market the project. To market the project, the developer can only enlist the services of a registered real estate agent. With this single stroke real estate agents with dubious credentials will be weeded out of the real estate sector in Maharashtra and more importantly from Mumbai.
In order to get himself registered the real estate agent needs to provide a whole host of disclosures to the authority.