Month: May 2023

Moving house is always a massive milestone worth celebrating, whether you are relocating to your dream apartment or a new rental place. The joyous occasion of housewarming is made even more memorable by friends and family who gather to shower you with their best wishes and share your special moment with you.

If you are on this invitee list, you must choose your housewarming gift with care and thought, keeping in mind the lifestyle and taste of the hosts, the spatial pattern and look and feel of the new home and last but not the least, your budget for the spend. There are a plethora of gifting options to choose from. You only need to apply your mind to the task to find the right one for the hosts.

Here are some gifting ideas while going to a housewarming party:

# Home appliances: In today’s breakneck lifestyle, most families are striving to cut manual labour in completing daily chores so that they can manage their time better. In this scenario, you can scarcely go wrong with home appliances as gift ideas to celebrate housewarming. Contraptions like air-fryers, juicer-blenders, coffee-makers, vacuum cleaners, electric kettles, etc., can be extremely useful and welcome solutions.

# Bluetooth speakers: Portable Bluetooth speakers are a wonderful gifting idea for lovers of music, since they can carry their favourite tunes around the house with them, from the living room to the kitchen and even to the bathroom. These speakers are now easily available in a variety of sizes and price points.

# Reusable flower jars: A bouquet of colourful flowers in a pretty, reusable glass jar is a great gift idea, since the elegant flower pot can be subsequently used for indoor plants or simply as part of the overall home décor.

# Reading lights: So many of us and our friends love to read and often stay up late to indulge our passion. For people like them, study lights can constitute a dear-to-heart housewarming gift. Nothing too extravagant or fancy, just warm and functional and personal.

# Fitness equipment: If your hosts are extremely fitness conscious, you could check with them what else they can do with and figure out a suitable gift. This might be one of those new AI-based fitness apps, a stationary bike or ab-crunchers. Don’t forget to check space available and what they already have.

# Wall décor: Tastefully coordinated wall décor accents like stickers, posters, hangings, shelves, framed paintings, etc. have the power of brightening up the entire house and draping everything with a happy vibe. Do keep in mind the colour scheme used for the house and also the style and personality of the new home owner/tenant.

# Lifestyle gift ideas: For hosts who are inherently stylish and flamboyant, you can choose from a clutch of lifestyle gift ideas like an LED liquor shelf, garden sprinklers, wall-mounted speakers, aroma diffusers, smart indoor planters, exotic potpourri, bean bags, scented candles, etc.

# Cozy gift ideas for close friends: For that best buddy or favourite cousin setting up a new home, often, quirky and fun gift ideas can work best. You can relive the good times you have had together by choosing from stuff like throw cushions, wall or hobby art, memorabilia, cheese board or a personalized rug. Champagne and wine or bespoke wine glasses also work well for close friends who are social drinkers. Or, for that matter, a mulled wine cocktail kit, complete with infusion bags and recipe guide.

When doing the interiors of our home, we often think about the shade of paint on the walls, the furniture in different rooms, the light fittings and the bathroom ware. We sometimes tend to forget the flooring in the bargain. However, the importance of choosing the right flooring for your new home can’t be overemphasized. Doing your research right and finding out about the options available can help you choose the right flooring material and remain worry-free for years.

It’s not just about aesthetics, rather, more about function. So, the nature of the space and its usage will both come into play. That means you might need different flooring solutions for the different rooms in your home. It also depends on the climate in your location, your lifestyle, the size and shape of the room and of course, your budget.

The look and feel of your floor will influence a whole lot of things that make up your interiors, including light fittings and wall shades, not to mention furniture. The flooring must be in sync with the overall design and spatial use of the area being covered, while ensuring visual appeal and longevity. So, choose your floor well.

What are the different flooring options you can choose from?

# Marble: Areas of your home which don’t experience high foot traffic are suitable for marble flooring. It exudes a sense of class and also can last long, but must be used in the right spaces.

# Vitrified tiles: Vitrified tiles are a favoured flooring option for many homes and are made by adding silica and clay to the mix of ceramic tiles. Albeit somewhat more expensive than ceramic tiles, these are easily procured and easily laid. Besides, you can choose from a plethora of colour and pattern options for a really attractive flooring solution and a great alternative to granite or marble.

# Vinyl: If you have pets in the house, vinyl can be a great flooring option. It provides soft cushioning which can ensure traction for their limbs and help protect their joints. It also resembles wood in appearance and exudes the same sense of warmth as hardwood. Yet another plus working in favour of vinyl is that it’s a wonderful sound absorber. So, you can cut out the reverbs on your favourite music.

# Wood: The biggest advantage of using hardwood for your flooring is that it’s neutral and goes well with any style of interior irrespective of the colour palette or the design language you choose. Also, because of its innate durability, hardwood can increase the resale value of your home substantially. A note of caution though. In very humid conditions, wood flooring could swell and deform if not sealed well. So please take utmost care at the installation stage.

# Laminate: Since laminates are tough and can withstand a lot of stress, these constitute a great flooring option for areas that receive high foot traffic. Besides, laminates are easy to maintain and relatively less expensive, not to mention their versatility.

# IPS: Indian patent stone is another inexpensive flooring alternative. Made of concrete mix, IPS has a more rustic and unpolished veneer and is extremely durable. You can keep stains away if you take care with using sealing solution or a coat of wax.

With the continuous migration of people from smaller towns to metro cities, and time an increasingly precious commodity, gated communities have been sprouting in big cities and its fringes. And why not? In today’s breakneck urban lifestyle, this seems to be the perfect solution, combining the pleasures of aesthetics and the benefits of functionality.

Real estate developers investing in this domain are providing a host of attractive add-ons like parks, children’s play areas, jogging and cycling trails, outdoor sports facilities, swimming pool, landscaped gardens, formatted meeting areas, yoga and meditation centre and a lot more.

The idea is to provide a whole gamut of options within the walls of the gated community itself so that residents don’t need to step out for many pursuits, while providing the tools and encouragement to stay fit as well as active and passive entertainment. However, the biggest plus that residents have come to value in these projects is the sense of bonding that tends to develop with your neighbours, thus fostering a community feeling that’s priceless.

Some of the advantages of open space in a gated community include:

# Better quality of life: The wide, open spaces ensure better ventilation, less pollution and noise and as a consequence, a more peaceful and better-quality life. You look forward to coming home after a grueling day at work as the greenery and peace and the inviting pool beckon. Once you are inside, you have all the accoutrements to spend real quality time with your family.

# Live healthy: The abundance of greenery and open space and access to sports like tennis and swimming and even open-air workout zones provide you and your family the right ingredients and motivation to stay fit and healthy. The peace and quiet can be surprisingly de-stressing after a hard week or a tough day and have a profoundly positive psychological impact on residents, improving their emotional and spiritual well-being.

# Secured ROI: The demand for gated residential projects has been steadily on the rise, even before Covid-19 struck. After the pandemic, it has only gathered momentum as most home-seekers these days prefer living in a large-format gated development rather than a standalone house so that they can avail of home-plus features like large open spaces, better security, a plethora of outdoor activities and the general peace and quiet. When this format is so coveted, a handsome return on your investment is obviously guaranteed.

# Bond better with neighbours: The large open spaces are designed to encourage social interaction. Residents tend to gather at common meeting areas, engaging in conversation that promotes camaraderie and friendship. This internal community becomes very important and precious in today’s rushed, volatile and unpredictable world where social interaction is otherwise diminishing and often neighbours aren’t even acquainted with one another.

# Bonus for kids, elderly: For growing children and the elderly residents, the open spaces in a complex are a boon. The kids can play and run around, thus getting valuable physical exercise while making friends and enjoying themselves thoroughly. This is critical for their physical and mental development and a bonus for their parents who don’t have to take them outside to pursue physical activities. Similarly, the aged residents can go on their routine of morning or evening walks in a serene and secure environment and interact with others of their age group that can help relieve stress and fight loneliness.

The pandemic has turned the entire mode of business in commercial real estate on its head. Site visits, paperwork, bank cheques and handshakes are passe. Thanks to the penetration of cutting-edge technology, transactions in the commercial real estate domain today are enabled by contactless remote technology including virtual tours, paperless deals and the like, powered by artificial intelligence, with the aim of reducing human interaction and boosting efficiency.

In the light of such sweeping changes in the commercial real estate landscape, you can’t afford to lag behind in adopting smart tech. It’s no longer an option, it’s now a necessity.

So, what are the must-have tech tools you should invest in?

# Virtual tours and CRM: One of the biggest disruptions in the real estate industry in recent years has been the use of virtual 3-D tours of properties, a technology further perfected during the pandemic. This is an absolute must-have in today’s context with customers less mobile and hamstrung in many other ways. Such virtual visits must be supported by a sophisticated customer relationship management (CRM) system through which you can guide the prospective customer through the entire process by using chat and email, answering each and every query along the way to close the loop efficiently.

# Digital storage, automation: The era of mountains of paper files and folders is gone. Documents must be digitally stored these days and you need to invest in that mechanism. Also, the entire ecosystem of payments and invoicing and rent collection, etc must be automated so that keeping track of changes and increments becomes a lot easier and you deploy a lot less manpower in those areas. The investment you make in such automation is worth every penny as you will recover the cost in double quick time.

# AI or Artificial Intelligence: Today, commercial real estate owners can make use of AI tools to take care of the entire property management infrastructure which would span security to monitoring to temperature control to running repairs and routine maintenance. This AI comfort saves both time and manpower, which you can gainfully redirect towards handling the sales pipeline and boost lead conversion.

# Building Information Modelling (BIM) software: This is a relatively new tool that enables the entire team of developers, architects, engineers, investors, etc to work in tandem through the planning, designing and execution process of the property using 3D models. So, instead of the old-fashioned blueprints of designs and drawings, BIM can provide a detailed 3D imagery of the project, giving both developer and buyer a clearer picture at the press of a key.

# Tenant management portals: Transparency is the buzzword in today’s real estate industry and since the commercial real estate segment is dominated by lease rentals, tenants are always looking for the assurance of transparency from their landlords. By using these portals to manage lease renewal or amendment, easy access to lease documents, maintenance requests, rent collection, etc, you can ensure transparency is at the core of your business philosophy. It also substantially cuts down on the time and bandwidth you spend on calls and emails.

# Automation in social media advertising: Using social media advertising automation, commercial real estate developers can generate new campaigns automatically through hi-tech software systems and market those campaigns to a targeted audience for optimum results. Such ad automation allows realtors to access real-time data analytics like demographics, views, clicks, etc, and thus fine-tune marketing strategy as they go along. With fast-changing algorithms used by search engines, it has become more pertinent to harp on market leadership and boost brand awareness. It helps when your social media ad systems are automated to reach the right audience every time.

Recommendation:

Project of the week – Amantran, 129 limited edition row bungalows, located next to Joka Metro