XA

Wednesday 12 February 2014

CARPET TO SUPER BUILT UP AREA IN AN APARTMENT HOUSE


The apartment culture is of recent origin and has become very popular. This type of group housing is not alien to the human civilization.Earlier people used to live on riverbanks in groups sharing common facilities.In the early twentieth century,Bangalore was known for such group housing but in a different manner.Group housing popularly known as “Vatara” was very common in Bangalore,where small dwelling units were constructed in a single compound and families live in perfect harmony and unison.The Vatara, used to be horizontal or L shaped with single storey buildings whereas the apartments are vertical with multistoried buildings.In Bangalore in the early seventies, the first apartment constructed as Shalimar Apartments.

Story of the super built up area:
The apartment concept has picked up in early seventies.On those days, builders used to sell the flats quoting the rate only for the carpet area, which was available inside the premises.Some of the builders used to take 50% area of the common wall between the two flats and added for the build up area. Gradually the promoters started to sell the flat on the built up area rather than carpet area.The difference between the carpet area and built up area is around 8%.Selling the flat on the built up area at the rate of per sqft is more affordable since it is lower than the carpet area, which attracts the purchasers. In the early nineties,the builders have effected certain attractive method of calculating the saleable area of an apartment, which includes staircase, lift and lobby areas and later add it on the ‘prorata basis’ to individual flats at the time of sale and thus the practice of selling on ‘super built up area basis’ has started slowly by almost all the builders and developers.The difference between carpet and super built-up area was generally in the range of 16 to 35% depending on the number of lifts, the width of the staircase,and planning of common passages and lobbies, etc.

Secret of the Promoters:
The mode adopted by the Promoter for calculating the super builtup area is a very confidential affair and would never incline to disclose the information to the General Public.Ultimately the intending purchasers are being targeted and victimized. Greedy, Promoters charge the super built up area between 50 to 55%. For example,if the rate of the flat is 2,000 per sq ft, then the flat can be charged at 1,500 per sq feet if the super built up area charged is 50%. Thus, the super built up area will vary from smaller to bigger projects, having swimming pools, club house, lobbies and other facilities, which, in turn increases the super built up area. Infact, I spoke to few of the leading promoters to gather information as to how they arrive at calculating super built up area, but they denied to answer the same stating that it is their professional secret, which cannot be spoken about.

However, the following are the meaning of the terminologies used in the flats:
Carpet area:
Carpet area is the area of the room measured inside wall to inside wall including door jams. Column projections inside the rooms are not deductible while arriving the carpet area.

Plinth Area:
It means the built up covered area of the building immediately above the plinth level. Otherwise, in an apartment building outer wall to outer wall can be considered as the plinth area

Super built-up area:
Built up area of the flat plus the proportionate area of the stair case, including landings, lift, lobby and passage on each floor and common servant toilet on each floor distributed among all the flats and the floor in proportion of the built up area.

Fair practice of the super built up area:
Generally, balcony area will be included in the super built up area. Balcony area formed integral and fully usable part of the flat. Some of the builders provide more balconies which can be built with small expenses and charged as super built up area at higher rate. A carpet area in the building is little less than  the promised area because of the skirting projection of the wall as the routine practice  to provide for cleanliness in the corner of the walls and the floor, which will reduce a ignorable portion of the carpet area.

Duper built up area:
In the present situation, few of the builders are charging duper built up area due to unprecedented rise in the prices. There are no standard norms required to be followed by the builders pertaining to saleable area and so each one of them will fix their own norms to arrive at the saleable area. Now a days, builders consider the entrance hall on ground floor, meter room, flower beds, pump room, etc and other constructions on the saleable area. The builders fix certain percentage of the super built up area on the basis of the carpet area. For example, if the built up area is 100 and super built up area is 40, then the actual rate required to be charged is only 40%. On the other hand, the builders reverse the above mode and consider 140 as the build up area, 100 as carpet area, then the super built up area will be charged 28.5%, which is the tricky way of arriving at the calculation, called Duper Built Up area.
         
Apart from this, the builders are selling separate gardens and terrace area along with the saleable area, which is not advisable since the above are properties owned commonly by all the flat owners.

Saleable/Chargeable Area:
The Saleable/Chargeable Area shall be the Built-up Area of the flat plus the proportionate area of the staircase, including landings, lift, lobby and passages on each floor and common servant toilet on each floor, distributed among all the flats on the floor in proportion to the Built-up Area.

Besides the above, following will be added:-
Additional area, on account of extra height of the room/rooms to the extent it is counted in the FSI calculation.Entrance hall, staircase including landings, lift and lift lobby on the ground floor shall be distributed to the entire building in proportion to the Built – up Area of each flat. Any other area considered in FSI.

In general,the good promoter shall not include the following area in salable area Society office,Common toilet block on ground floor,Mail room,Electric meterroom,Pumproom,Sub-station,Generatorroom,Securitycabin,Staircase well,Any ducts and voids,Lift machine room,Elevation boxes,Over head and underground tanks,Lofts,Flower beds,Common terrace,Refuge area,Open sports facilities,Swimming pool,Drying area provided for clothes drying,Ramp,Walkways ducts for various services like electric,plumbing,Septic tank/Sewage Treatment Plant (STP),Atrium open to sky,Compound wall


Thus, while purchasing the flat, the purchaser has to find out the rate per sq ft, actual rate that has been loaded on the carpet area and amenities provided, which are the basic factors that decides the Flat rate.

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