Shilpa Shetty & Raj Kundra foray into real estate sector

Bollywood actor and Big Brother winner Shilpa Shetty and her British-born Indian businessman husband Raj Kundra are foraying into the real estate business in a big way by launching a premium residential apartment complex near the Mumbai domestic airport and by bidding for Hindustan Unilever's Gulita property in Worli.

The co-owners of the IPL cricket team Rajasthan Royals on Wednesday also announced a tie-up with a Mumbai entrepreneur to launch an Indian property discount site, targeting group buyers looking for a bargain.

Kundra Constructions, Kundra's company, has bought a plot of land near the Mumbai domestic airport, where it will construct premium residential apartments priced between Rs 1 crore and Rs 5 crore, Raj Kundra told ET. The project will be launched in the next three months and Kundra is open to partnership for further development, he said.

The NRI businessman also confirmed he has bid for Hindustan Unilever's oneacre Worli property Gulita, roughly valued at Rs 250 crore. "Gulita is a beautiful property which we would like to develop into a commercial project. But HUL is asking for 50-year lease term, while almost all such deals of this nature are got for a 99-year lease. It is now up to the lawyers," he said.

Kundra, alongwith his wife, was in town to launch his new venture Groupco Infracom Pvt Ltd, in which he is an equal partner with Hem Tejuja, a first generation entrepreneur. "There is no better time than now to launch this portal. Both, the developers are very keen on selling, while home buyers are looking for the best deals. We see a great catalyst role for ourselves," he said. "GHB harnesses the power of group buying and empowers each individual home buyer to get significant volume discounts which are almost unachievable individually,” Hem added.

Says Raj Kundra & Shilpa Shetty Kundra  “We are  very excited about our latest venture into e-commerce and strongly believe it is the future of home buying.

Raj also sees a huge demand coming in from NRIs for whom the portal will provide a wide range of properties to choose from across India. The price band for the end user would range between Rs 50 lakh to Rs 3 crore.