Cushman & Wakefield reported that land transactions in India totalled 18,158 acres over the five years to the first quarter of 2026, attributing the rise to economic growth, infrastructure capital expenditure and employment generation, according to Somy Thomas, the firm's executive managing director for capital markets. Improved expressway connectivity and expanding urban corridors increased demand for housing, offices, retail and warehousing. Residential land accounted for 45 per cent of acreage transacted between 2021 and Q1 2026.

Office-linked transactions rose fivefold from 76 acres in 2021-22 to 384 acres in 2024-25, while industrial and logistics acreage expanded nearly thirteenfold, reaching 27 per cent of transactions in 2024-25 from 7 per cent in 2021-22. Manufacturing growth, government schemes such as Make in India and production-linked incentive programmes supported industrial demand, and ecommerce and modern retail underpinned warehousing. Data centre land deals have increased in size since 2021, adding a digital infrastructure component to land demand.

Tier-I markets accounted for 71 per cent of total transacted acreage in 2021 to Q1 2026 but Tier-II activity grew sharply as annual transactions increased from 16 acres in 2021 to 2,120 acres in 2025, lifting their share of annual transactions from about 2 per cent to 34 per cent. Average Tier-I deal size fell while Tier-II averages rose, and cities including Coimbatore, Indore, Visakhapatnam, Ludhiana, Panipat and Nagpur are cited as growth corridors.

Outright purchases comprised over 60 per cent of acreage transacted, at 10,910 acres, while joint ventures and joint development structures covered about 4,405 acres and rose in number from 11 in 2021 to 42 in 2025. Long-lease transactions totalled nearly 2,520 acres and redevelopment added 323 acres. Domestic developers led acquisitions and primarily used internal or private capital due to limited debt availability for land purchases. The report estimates that the 18,158 acres could support 559–768 million square feet (mn sq ft) of residential development, 205–225 mn sq ft industrial and logistics, 109–179 mn sq ft office, 113–124 mn sq ft data centres and 8–26 mn sq ft retail, with potential to create nearly one point four billion square feet (bn sq ft) of built-up stock.