Tirupur's land
Billed as the knitwear capital of India, Tirupur is famous for its business vibrancy. As commercial and residential realty are growing at a brisk pace, the mill-land sale story is getting bigger day by day in the region with many old and sick textile mills being converted into apartments and other commercial spaces. Around 40 ginning factories in town are being converted into shopping complexes, office spaces and apartments. Industrial: Not all the mill-owners’ buildings are for the owners’ use. Many, especially huge factory buildings, are being rented out. Since the export business gained momentum two decades ago, renting out such buildings has become common.
Around 20–30% of the companies here function from rented buildings. Sources say that given the exorbitant land costs it is very difficult for an entrepreneur to invest huge sums on a factory building during the early stages of his business. Renting out a building for production base is common. The rent for these buildings ranges between Rs 5 and Rs 7 a sq ft depending on the area and facility. Demand for buildings too differs. “Earlier, people needed a building of 3,000-5,000 sq ft to start a factory. Now, they are going in for bigger ones that starts from 10,000 sq ft and goes beyond 30,000 sq ft”, sources added. Commercial: Tirupur has three business class hotels — Poppys, Velans Greenfield and Angels — all three-star hotels promoted by knitwear exporters from the region. Taj also plans to come up with a 100-room budget hotel with a probable investment of Rs 10 crore. Sources said two acres have been identified for the property on the arterial Kangeyam Road. Ginger Hotels too plans to check in at Tirupur and is in the process of identifying land.
Residential: Presently, around a dozen housing projects are under construction in Tirupur to cater mainly to the upper middle class and business class requirements. Each house starts from the 1,500 sq ft range with a price tag of Rs 14 lakh. But, this has been treated as a low range one and there are few takers for this. VGV Constructions, a pioneer in bringing out the apartment trend in Tirupur in 1993, has massive projects at Kangeyam Road and Avainashi Road with 1,800 individual houses each. The property development division of Prime Textiles is promoting the first-ever township in Tirupur at a cost of Rs 90 crore on a six-acre site on the prime Avinashi Road area. Jains Housing is developing Palm n Meadows — a 704 premium apartments with a price tag of Rs 50 lakh.