RERA: MahaRERA not to extend registration deadline for ongoing projects
“There is no question of extending the deadline for registration of projects under MahaRERA. So far 300 projects have registered with us and the pace of applications wanting to register has increased,” Chatterjee told reporters on the sidelines of the CII-JLL summit here.
Chatterjee said he expects about 20,000 ongoing projects to be registered by the end of July. Any ongoing project that is being marketed needs to be registered with the authority or else it would be taken as violation of section 3 of MahaRERA rules.
The government enacted the Real Estate (Regulation & Development) Act 2016 and all the sections of the Act have come into force with effect from May 1, this year. Maharashtra was one of the first to notify its rules under the Act and establish MahaRERA.
For ongoing projects, promoters are expected to apply for registration under the respective state authorities within a period of three months from the date of commencement of the Act. Real estate brokerages and agents are also not allowed to practice until they get registered with the authority. In June, MahaRERA, in its first ruling, imposed a fine against a property broker for advertising multiple unregistered residential projects.
The authority directed the property broker to stop the advertisements of unregistered projects with immediate effect and rectify all the hoardings by putting MahaRERA registration number on the same. According to RERA, which aims to improve transparency in the real estate sector and protect homebuyers’ interests, builders are expected to disclose project-related information including project plan, layout and government approvals-related information to customers.
Any major change in the project will be done only after receiving the consent of two-thirds of homebuyers in that project. To avoid diversion of funds, RERA mandates that developers should maintain 70% of the funds collected from buyers in a separate bank account in case of new projects.