September 11, 2025: From Bandra to Dahisar, and from Andheri to Borivali and Goregaon to Juhu, Mumbai’s Western Suburbs have emerged as the epicentre of the city’s redevelopment activity, accounting for nearly 70 per cent of all society redevelopment deals in the post-COVID period.
According to Knight Frank’s latest market research, between 2020 and the first half of 2025, Mumbai recorded 910 society redevelopment deals. Of these, 633 were concentrated in the Western Suburbs alone. By contrast, the Central Suburbs saw 234 societies opting for redevelopment, while South and Central Mumbai together accounted for just 43 societies.
The data highlights a clear geographical trend. The Western Suburbs unlocked close to 235.6 acres of built-up area—more than 70 per cent of the city’s total redevelopment footprint. Experts attribute this surge to wider roads, favourable FSI norms, and relatively well-structured housing societies, which have enabled faster deals.
Developers, too, have embraced redevelopment over traditional land acquisition, adopting asset-light models that minimise upfront equity, ease balance sheet pressure, and open up core city locations. Many have even set up dedicated platforms to streamline approvals, resolve legal issues, and aggregate projects efficiently.
Societies are also adopting new approaches. Some cooperative housing societies are pursuing self-redevelopment, backed by favourable policies and financial incentives, while others prefer established developers and Project Management Consultants (PMCs).
The Knight Frank report observed, “While some dense districts in Tokyo or Hong Kong surpass Mumbai’s averages [of population density], they remain far more liveable due to coordinated land recycling, high-spec vertical development, and infrastructure investments.”
For Mumbai, the redevelopment wave is expected to deliver safer, larger, and better-equipped homes, unlock under-utilised land in prime zones like Andheri, and align population density with infrastructure upgrades—an ambition further supported by the DCPR 2034 framework, MHADA’s cessed building policies, and additional FSI and TDR incentives.
Source: The Week
