Developer asked to prepone possession date by 2 years

HOME BUYER GETS RELIEF FROM RERA...

A home buyer, who approached Maharashtra Real Estate Regulatory Authority (MahaRERA) with a complaint pertaining to delayed possession date, got a relief after the bench provided with a possession date after preponing it by two years. The bench preponed the possession date from 2020 to 2018.

The complainant Nihit Mathur approached the RERA bench with the complaint against the developer Ekta Parksville Homes Private Limited.

“We had purchased an apartment in the project ‘Ekta Parksville Phase-II’ in Virar after registering an agreement of sale on June 13, 2014. The date of possession as per the said agreement was December 2016. However, the developer delayed the possession and has put June 2020 as the revised project completion date in their registration. We intend to withdraw from the project as per the provisions of Section 18 of the Real Estate (Regulation and Development) Act 2016,” said Mathur.

The advocate for the respondent, Abir Patel, argued that the construction work of the project is delayed because of mitigating circumstances which were beyond the respondent’s control. He added that the Respondent will be able to handover possession of the said apartment by October 31, 2018.

Further, he offered to look into the issues raised by the complainant pertaining to payment of pre-Equated Monthly Instalment (pre-EMI) by the complainant. Both the parties agreed to arrive at a mutual settlement regarding the payment of pre-EMI.

After hearing both the parties, the RERA bench directed the developer to handover the possession of the said apartment with Occupancy Certificate to the home buyer before October 2018, failing which the developer shall be liable to pay interest to the complainant from November 1, 2018 till the actual date of possession. This would be on the entire amount paid by the complainant to the respondent.

The bench stated that the said interest would be at the rate as prescribed under Rule 18 of the Maharashtra Real Estate (Regulation and Development) (Registration of Real Estate Projects, Registration of Real Estate Agents, Rate of Interest and Disclosures on Website) Rules of 2017.

The respondent argued that the construction work of the project is delayed because of mitigating circumstances which were beyond the respondent’s control.