Realty investment firm Hines to focus on southern India

US-based real estate investment firm Hines plans to increase its presence in southern India by entering the Chennai and Hyderabad real estate sectors as it aims to double its Indian portfolio over the next two to three years, its country head Amit Diwan said. Currently, Bengaluru is the largest market for Hines India, with two office projects and one residential project totalling more than 4.2 million square feet. “We are expecting southern India to be our single largest chunk of investment in India and maybe we will do multiple deals a year,” said Diwan. The company plans to invest a minimum $50 million for each major investment across markets. It will explore new office projects through development management and forward purchase agreements, apart from looking at greenfield acquisitions in prime locations, including Mumbai and Gurugram. “We have a pipeline across all these markets,” said Diwan. Currently, Hines India company has projects spread over 12.5 million sq ft in its Indian portfolio. Ithas seven office and three residential projects under various stages of development across the National Capital Region (NCR), Mumbai, Bengaluru and Pune. “We have not deployed capital in India in the last three years ... we decided to build execution capabilities before deploying capital,” said Diwan. Also Read: Interest rate hike has not deterred most home buyers: survey Housing sales in major cities see 9-year high: Knight Frank