Indian developers turn to joint development agreements due to rising land costs
An ANAROCK report stated that joint development agreements accounted for 25 percent of total land deals in the first nine months of the year 2026.
By Capital Kranti desk, Gandhinagar · Editor: Parth Thakkar
11 November 2026, 2:39 pm · 3 min read
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According to a BusinessLine report, land acquisition activity in India slowed down in the first nine months of the year 2026 due to rising land costs and concerns regarding project viability, causing developers to turn increasingly towards joint development agreements or JDAs rather than making outright purchases.
During this period, the share of JDAs among total land deals executed stood at about 25 percent. According to ANAROCK, at least 19 out of the 76 land deals completed in the first nine months of the year 2026 were through joint development agreements.
During this period, 76 land deals covering approximately 1,445 acres of land were recorded, indicating a more cautious and selective approach by developers. The share of JDA transactions in the overall land deal mix has continuously increased. The number of such deals was 10 in the year 2022, which rose to 30 in the year 2025. In the year 2022, the share of JDAs in total land deals was about 12 percent, which rose to nearly 24 percent in the year 2025 and subsequently reached 25 percent in the first nine months of the year 2026.
Mayank Saksena, MD and CEO of Land Services at ANAROCK Group, stated that as project economics are becoming more important, developers are progressively turning towards JDAs with previous landowners. These transactions are different from joint ventures (JVs), where developers partner with other developers who have limited capacity to complete projects. Under the JDA arrangement, developers can acquire land through partnership rather than direct purchase and construct projects. Transaction partners now have a lot of work to structure such partnerships.
This slowdown was particularly evident in large deals. Out of the 76 deals recorded during the nine-month period, only 5 deals involved land parcels of 50 acres or more, whereas 12 such deals took place in the corresponding period of the year 2025. Their combined area decreased from approximately 2,398 acres to around 588 acres.
Between the year 2022 and the first nine months of the year 2026, a total of 516 land deals were recorded across the country, covering 12,958 acres of land. The year 2024 saw the highest number of transactions with 133 deals covering over 2,515 acres of land, while the year 2025 recorded the highest area with 126 deals spread across 3,772 acres of land.
Seven established metropolitan markets—Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR), National Capital Region (NCR), Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Pune, Chennai and Kolkata—accounted for about 86 percent of the 516 deals recorded between the year 2022 and the first nine months of the year 2026. However, they accounted for only about 57 percent of the total 12,958 acres of land acquired, indicating growing activities in regions beyond established metro cities.
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