THE SINGHS, GURGAON SUBURBAN BUSS Amit Singh, an Indian airlines pilot, with wife Kavita and daughter Dopti, outside his new home at Vista Villa, Gurgaon. Delhi's satellite township is, arguably, the most happening real-estate market in India.

Its vital stats ensure that Gurgaon is India's hottest real estate market, and by a long shot: in the past three years, about a dozen developers, some of India's biggest names such as DLF, Unitech, and Gesco among them, have sold 20,000 homes valued at an estimated Rs 3,000 crore. It helps that the suburb has space, lots of it, to grow (over 24,000 acres, actually), and that it has managed to attract companies, both Indian and international, to set up their offices. Living close to where they work is a bonus for the executives of these companies although Gurgaon has other things going for it: think large flats, reasonable real-estate rates, relatively clean air, adequate parking, and power back-up. With enough (and more) malls, pubs, and multiplexes, Gurgaon is more a self-contained city than a satellite.

Mumbai doesn't have a Gurgaon (don't even try drawing a parallel with Vashi), but the city's real estate action is restricted to the suburbs. Satellite Thane, western suburb Malad and eastern suburb Mulund are booming real-estate markets. Hiranandani Constructions is building two townships in the first, K. Raheja Corp is active in the second, and Nirmal Lifestyle is developing 15 lakh square feet of residential space in the third. Expectedly, all three suburbs will have their own malls and multiplexes. Still, that's not a patch on Gurgaon where there are some 10 screens within a road's width of each other. That's happening for you.

A summer home in the hills, a beach-front cottage, even an apartment at a pilgrimage centre like Vrindavan or Puttaparthi—the urban well-heeled is looking for a second home away from the city.

THE FREE AND ROVING SPIRIT
The urban rich is now investing in holiday homes.

Beach-front property on the road-by-the-shore from Chennai to Pondicherry; holiday homes in the hills being vended by developers such as the Raheja Group and Central Himalayan Land Development Company (CHLDC); and flats in popular centres of worship such as Puttaparthi, Vrindavan, and Rishikesh-increasingly, the urban well-heeled (even those getting there) is investing in holiday homes such as this.

CHLDC is vending 200 houses (prices range from Rs 20 lakh to a crore) on 300-acre spreads in Almora and Mukteshwar, and is developing another 200 acres in the Kumaon Hills. Down south, Vishva Resorts has already sold a third of the 45 villas it has developed on a 16-acre property in Kodaikanal (for Rs 17.5 lakh to Rs 26.5 lakh). Forget the really monied, even plus are buying holiday homes. Says R. Ravi, Managing Partner of Electromags, a Chennai-based auto components manufacturer who has a holiday home in Kodaikanal, "Apart from the locale, it made sense because the land value was appreciating.''

The trend of holiday homes is just beginning, but is accelerating with more people buying their first homes while they are still young. Apart from being a sound investment-real estate prices in most hill stations and other such centres are still within reach and headed north-a holiday home has an intangible allure to it. If it is located close enough, you can make it a week-end retreat. Then, there's the common urban dream of chucking it all up one day and making a home in the hills.

Whether it is Delhi's wannabe-city of a satellite township Gurgaon (left), or Mumbai's Thane (centre) and Mulund areas, or the area adjoining Kolkata's Eastern Bypass (right), suburbia has become a way of life in some cities.

IT'S A GREAT TIME TO BE A DEVELOPER
Just ask a clutch of worthies that's made millions from the housing boom.

Total Environment's Kamal Sagar: Cashing in on the tech boom

DLF's K.P. Singh: Gurgaon's undisputed property pasha

Hiranandani Constructions' Niranjan Hiranandani: Powai, Thane, Versova, and smile!

Elephant grass that came up to his shoulders made the land on the Delhi-Ghaziabad border that Harpal Singh was inspecting look like a mini-jungle. It was a night in 1996 and Singh, then the owner of a modest hotel-chain in Northern India was looking at land on which the Ghaziabad Development Authority had built a housing complex for which it couldn't find any buyers. A snake crossed the path Singh was on and helped make up his mind; turning to his 21-year-old son Mohit he said, ''That's lucky; we should buy this property.'' That wasn't possible, but he did manage to forge a joint venture with GDA to market the 1,352 flats in the housing complex. Singh did that easily, by modifying the flats slightly and pricing them at Rs 5.6 lakh-over a third of the flats went in the first 15 days. Today, Singh's Shipra Estate (turnover in 1996-97: Rs 5 crore) is a Rs 100-crore company.

Across the country, developers such as Shipra have made a killing from the housing boom. DLF's K.P. Singh is Gurgaon's undisputed property pasha having sold 12,000 homes in the suburb so far-his company, which introduced India to the condo culture, hopes to sell another 12,000 over the next five years. In another Delhi suburb, Surajkund, the Rs 200-crore Eros Group has already built 1,200 apartments. Even in land-starved Mumbai developers such as Hiranandani Constructions (it has developed townships in Powai, Thane, and Versova), and Nirmal Lifestyle (Mulund) have managed to sell all they can build. That's evident in the turnover of these companies. DLF Universal's is Rs 350 crore (2001-02), up from Rs 173 crore five years ago; Hiranandani's Rs 325 crore, up from Rs 75 crore. That's a saga of growth that's reflected in Pune, where Lalit Kumar Jain's Kumar Builders is simultaneously developing 22 residential properties, Kolkata, where Sumit Dabriwala's Calcutta Metropolitan Group has sold 850 of the 991 flats in its premier Highland Park project (prices range from Rs 14.5 lakh to Rs 60 lakh), Bangalore where the rise of technology companies has created a class that can afford homes while still in its late 20s, much to the delight of developers such as the Prestige Group (its turnover crossed Rs 200 crore in 2003) and relative new-entrant Total Environment. ''Right now, there is demand for apartments that cost below Rs 15 lakh or over Rs 65 lakh," says Ramesh Kumar Reddy, the MD of Chennai-developer Chaitanya Builders, articulating a trend that is visible across the country, even in smaller cities like Hyderabad and Coimbatore. In the first, for instance, Pawan Kumar Agrawall's Ambience Properties is developing 60 plush independent/row houses on the Medchal Road that is dotted with farm houses on Hyderabad's northern fringe. The going price: Around Rs 25 lakh. Little wonder then, the three gentlemen pictured on this page look happy.