Mumbai-based private developer Lodha Group has struck the most expensive single apartment sale deal in the country involving a super-luxury duplex apartment in south Mumbai's tony Altamount Road locality for Rs 160 crore (over $24 million) or at Rs 160,000 per sq ft, the highest price per sq ft surpassing all earlier benchmarks.
Name of the buyer has not been disclosed by the company. However, media reports said that the buyer is the unnamed promoter of a pharma company.
The apartment is spread over 10,000 sq ft over 33rd and 34th floor of the developer's under-construction project.
Lodha had bought the land parcel for this project, being built on the site of Washington House in Mumbai, from US consulate for Rs 342 crore in 2012.
The most expensive residential property so far was a sea-facing duplex apartment, in a building on Mount Pleasant Road in south Mumbai's Malabar Hill locality, that was sold for Rs 1.35 lakh per sq ft or Rs 57 crore in 2013.
Last month, Lodha Group sold a five-bedroom luxury apartment at One Altamount project under its The Luxury Collection for Rs 40 crore. The project will have a limited number of three- and four-bedroom residences and five-bedroom villas.
Some of the large private property deals in Mumbai include the recent purchase of the Lincoln House in Mumbai by Pune-based billionaire industrialist Cyrus Poonawalla in September this year.
Poonawalla, chairman of Poonawalla Group, agreed to around Rs 750 crore (approximately $113 million) for the iconic Lincoln House in the Breach Candy area of south Mumbai, the largest ever private property deal in the country's financial capital.
The high-profile deal came within a week of industrialist Kumar Mangalam Birla buying Jatia House, the iconic Malabar Hill bungalow at Mumbai which was bought by industrialist MP Jatia in 1971 from Meher Cawasji Vakeel, in a deal worth Rs 425 crore (approximately $63 million).
Jatia House, which has Burma teak wood interiors, numerous gardens and offers a sea view in one of Mumbai's most revered residential localities, is also next door to Mehrangir, the home of late Indian nuclear physicist Homi J Bhabha.
Last year, Mehrangir was bought by Pheroza Godrej, wife of Jamshyd Godrej of Godrej & Boyce, for Rs 372 crore.
Founded in 1980, Lodha Group is developing an estimated 43 million sq ft of real estate projects, and has 28 ongoing projects across London, Mumbai, Pune and Hyderabad, as per the information available on the company's website. It is estimated to be the biggest privately held realtor in the country.
Recently, media reports said Lodha group has decided a major reorganisation of businesses wherein Abhishek Lodha, elder son of founder and BJP leader Mangal Prabhat Lodha, will get control over the real estate business of the group, while younger son Abhinandan is set to head the financial services business.
The new financial services venture will be engaged in housing finance, asset reconstruction and wholesale lending.