The overall supply share of studio apartments, among the hottest-selling configurations before the Covid-19 pandemic, has been dipping across the top seven cities since 2020, according to a research. Out of the 1,063 projects launched in H1 2022 across these cities, the latest ANAROCK research shows, only 91 projects offered studio apartments - a nine per cent share. In contrast, of the 1,921 projects launched in 2019, around 368 (19 per cent) had studio apartments. In 2020, the share was 15 per cent - of 884 projects launched in the year , and approximately 130 offered studio apartments, while 145 out of the 1,207 launched projects had them as options in 2021. This year-over-year decline is a significant trend reversal between 2013 and 2019. The share of new projects offering studio apartments showed an year-over-year increase from four per cent in 2013 to 19 per cent in 2019. “The studio apartment configuration - single rooms serving as bedroom-cum-living room with kitchenette and an attached bathroom - was among the most popular configurations before Covid-19,” ANAROCK Group chairman Anuj Puri said. “Once seen as ideal starter homes, they drew considerable demand from bachelors, business travellers visiting the city frequently for work and young couples. What they lack in size, they often make up on location - studio apartments are most evident in pricey locations around key employment hubs,” he added. Puri further said the “rapid reversal of this trend after Covid-19 is indicative of the major socio-economic changes” that have occurred due to the pandemic. “Of 2,102 projects launched in the top 7 cities in 2013, just 75 projects had this option. After that, their availability in projects grew consistently, peaking at 19% in 2019,” he added. 2020, the first and most devastating pandemic year, kick-started the work-from-home culture and the ensuing demand for bigger homes. City-wise trends: The studio apartments trend is historically the strongest in West India, with Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR) and Pune predominantly driving it. Of the total projects with studio apartments launched in the top seven cities between 2013-2020, MMR and Pune together accounted for a massive 96 per cent share. In contrast, the southern cities of Bengaluru, Chennai and Hyderabad never really caught the studio apartment wave - just 34 projects in these three cities had this compact configuration in the same period. Of the 91 projects offering studio apartments in H1 2022 across the top seven cities, MMR is at the top with 71 projects followed by Pune with 18 projects. In Bengaluru, just two projects offer this configuration, while the other cities do not offer it at all. Rise and fall of studio apartments: The pre-pandemic years saw studio apartments being offered not just in MMR and Pune but in other cities as well. As such, their supply share decline after the pandemic is remarkable.
