The global real estate group Knight Frank has ranked India 5th in the list of 30 emerging retail markets and predicted an impressive 20% growth rate for the organized retail segment by 2010. The organized segment is expected to grow from mere 2% to 20% by the end of the decade, it said. A report by Merrill Lynch said that the number of malls in Mumbai, Bangalore, New Delhi, Hyderabad, and Pune are expected to grow from 40 to about 250 by 2010. Simultaneously residential housing is also happening independently as a corollary of the commercial developments.

Another important development in the real estate market is the emergence of online real estate portals. Some of the latest Indian real estate portals are Persquareyard.com, Realestateonline.in and 99acres.com. On a website like 99acres.com one can advertise a property for selling or renting and also view listed properties for buying or leasing. The site currently has 1,00,000 residential and 10,000 commercial listings. For more information on this website log on to http://www.99acres.com

Some significant developments in the year 2005 have raised the challenge of bridging the gap between demand and supply such as an annual GDP growth of 8%, FDI relaxation and expanding sectors of IT, ITES and BPO. And its immediate effect could also be seen on the real estate market because growth drivers then would not only target metros but also non-metros.

This situation has recently catapulted the real estate sectors of cities like Kochi, Hyderabad, Pune and Chennai.

Kochi will soon emerge as one of the most happening second-tier metros in the country with long stretches of arching skylines and an influx of immigrants. The State Government has recently made efforts to draw in the lucrative IT sector to establish shops by opening info-parks and allotting plenty of incentives and spaces for projects like CSEZ and Dubai Internet City.

Hyderabad on the other hand is booming and becoming a hub for national and multinational corporations and educational institutes, Intel, Hyundai, Infosys, ISB, IIIT, BITS and more are set to arrive. It is the latest destination for MNCs, corporate and educational institutes of repute, which has led to an exponential rise in the real estate rates. This growth is further propelled because the city has no coastline, which makes it expandable from all sides and also its moderate climate, which is suitable to most industries.

Chennai, the fourth largest metropolitan city in India is a major trade centre, well linked by road, rail and air besides being a seaport. Chennai's office market has absorbed 0.45 million sq ft during the first quarter of 2006. According to a report by CB Richard Ellis, international property consultants, the buoyancy in the previous year has paved the way for prominent real estate developments in the city.

Also, Pune has totally transformed itself into a Silicon valley clone, which is the recent output of the IT boom. The Kharadi-Kalyani Nagar belt has undergone dramatic transformation and is unrecognizable if you are visiting the place after a gap of a few years. The once non-descript village on the western boundary of PMC has today some of Pune's biggest developers.

With this kind of widespread development of the real estate sector, which not only includes hugely invested projects, upcoming malls and townships, we can also see mediums like 99acres.com emerging to provide end to end solutions to people looking for residential and commercial property. And we can surely say the time is not far when this sector will be a major contributor in India's GDP.