Plenty of apartment complexes are in the making in cities and its neighbourhood in the State. But, budget-wise, many of these might be beyond the aspirations of the middle class.There was a time when ownership of apartments was seen as the mark of financial status. In those days, people bought apartments just to make a statement about their social position. Living in an apartment was still an alien concept. And an apartment was never a home, however posh it might be. And, came from the crowded cities such as Mumbai another image of apartments. A different one, not associated with the plush luxury of the upwardly mobile, but sadly symbolising the daily struggle for survival waged by the innumerable low and middle-income groups of the metro cities with a burgeoning population. Apartments mushroomed in mega cities, to accommodate the teeming millions.
Apartment culture
In
Kerala apartments, the apartment culture came late. But it caught on and these days apartments are mushrooming like anything not only in cities such Kochi or Thiruvananthapuram, but also in towns and even interior places. But, whom do the Kerala builders target? Who are the clients whom the construction groups target? Is the new apartment culture essentially an elitist phenomenon? Are middle and low-income groups aspiring to become apartment owners? The questions are many.
Even a cursory glance at the building scene in Kerala would be enough to tell anyone of its basic nature - that the apartments are essentially an upper-class phenomena. The big-time builders usually target the higher income groups as potential buyers. The `premium range' of many builders means prices starting from Rs.55 lakhs and upwards. And most of these structures are sold out even before the project is completed. Waterfront flats and villas are another category where the prices come high. The mere proximity of a water body, however polluted it might be, causes the prices to skyrocket.
If apartment culture has become the mark of high-class living, then the middle-class also has to follow suit. Interestingly, the cooperative housing society system, popular in metros such as Mumbai, is not in vogue in Kerala. In Mumbai, the cooperative societies had sprung up as an answer to the growing housing problem decades ago. Most of the cooperative society colonies have cluttered apartment blocks with three or four floors, stopping short of the mandatory height for installing a lift.
However, such an organised segment catering to the needs of the low and middle-income groups has not arisen in Kerala so far. In the earlier days of Mumbai, the flats meant where the `ordinary' people lived a cramped existence while the affluent lived in the relative luxury of individual homes spread over the quiet corners of the city.
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