Temporary capital sends house rents soaring

Vijayawada: The announcement of Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu that Vijayawada would be the temporary capital of the State had come as a blessing in disguise for the house owners. While the bifurcation had shot up the land prices by several hundred times, the temporary capital announcement had led to steep hike in the house rents.

The bifurcation had increased the real estate prices by several times, particularly in Krishna and Guntur districts. The land prices which were at Rs 2 crore an acre before bifurcation are now priced at Rs 12 crore and the realtors and enterprising politicians have bought several acres around Tadepalli, Mangalagiri, Tulluru, Tadikonda and Amaravathi mandals of Guntur, Gannavaram, Agiripalli, Nuzvid, Nandigama, Ibrahimpatnam and Vijayawada rural of Krishna district. It is now the turn of the house owners to hike the rents. The houses at Bhavanipuram and Vidyadharapuram areas have gone up from Rs 5,000 a month to Rs 7,000 a month for the double bedroom flats. The rental hike is almost same in Ajitsinghnagar, Satyanarayanapuram, Machavaram and Krishna Lanka areas where the middle class families live. However, in the posh areas of Mutyalampadu, Mogalarajapuram, Governorpet, Suryaraopet, Labbipet, Patamata, Currency Nagar, Ashok Nagar have gone up by several times. The two-bed room flat which was rented for Rs 10,000 a month till the other day has now gone up from Rs 18,000 to Rs 22,000.

Interestingly, the temporary capital announcement had now increased the demand for the apartments located on Tadepalli, the Guntur side of River Krishna. There are more than a dozen apartment blocks constructed in the last three to four years along the national highway. While some of them were occupied by the salaried staff over the last three years, more than 50 per cent of them are vacant till the other day. The rents too were as low as Rs 5,000 for a two-bedroom flat here and the temporary capital announcement had prompted the owners to hike the rents to Rs 15,000 at a time. The owners, surprisingly, are painting their flats to give them attractive look for the State government employees who are expected to come here shortly.

The residential areas of Labbipet, K P Nagar, Bharathinagar, Gurunanaknagar, Bank Colony, Nara Chandrababu Naidu Colony, Gayatrinagar have become most favourite places for the IAS, IPS and other senior officers to have their residences, besides some politicians, including Ministers in the present government. The houses in these areas in the city are being given new look to attract the tenants.