Check the builder in this order: RERA registration and filed timelines, occupancy certificates on past projects, the gap between promised and actual handover dates, who is funding the project, pending litigation, and what residents of the last completed phase say. Six of those seven are public records.
Key facts
- Every registered project files quarterly progress updates on the state RERA portal. Compare the filings over time rather than reading only the latest one.
- An occupancy certificate is the proof that a past project was completed legally. A delivery count without OCs is a marketing number.
- Delivery delay is best measured as the gap between the RERA-declared completion date and the actual handover date, project by project.
- Institutional funding is a useful signal because the investor has done its own diligence, with access you will never have.
- Litigation is searchable: state RERA orders, consumer commission orders and the e-Courts portal.
- The cheapest source of truth is a resident of the builder's last delivered project in the same city.
1. Start with the RERA registration, not the brochure
Ask for the project's RERA registration number and look it up yourself on the state portal. Telangana is tsrera.gov.in, Tamil Nadu is rera.tn.gov.in, Karnataka is rera.karnataka.gov.in. What you are reading for: the declared completion date, the approved plan, the land title documents filed with the application, and the promoter's list of past and ongoing projects.
A project advertised before registration is a warning in itself. Advertising an unregistered project is an offence under the Act, and a developer willing to do it has made a decision about which rules apply to them.
2. Read the quarterly progress filings in sequence
Registered promoters update progress every quarter. One filing tells you little. Four tell you the construction rate, and whether the declared completion date has quietly moved. If the same tower has been at "seventh slab" for three quarters, the question to the sales team is specific, and the answer is informative.
3. Count occupancy certificates, not units
Delivery claims are the easiest number to inflate. The verifiable version is the occupancy certificate, issued by the local authority when a completed building meets the approved plan and is fit to occupy. For each past project, ask for a copy of the OC. A builder with 20,000 delivered homes should be able to produce them without effort. A builder who offers a possession letter instead is answering a different question.
The related document is the completion certificate, and in some states a part-OC is issued tower by tower. Ask which towers are covered.
4. Measure the delay, project by project
| Column | Where to find it | What it tells you |
|---|---|---|
| RERA completion date as first declared | Original registration on the state portal | What the builder committed to |
| Revised completion dates | Extension applications and quarterly filings | Whether delays were admitted or absorbed |
| Actual handover date | Residents, OC date | The real number |
| Gap, in months | Your own subtraction | The builder's track record, in one figure |
Six months of slippage on a high-rise is ordinary. Three years, repeated across projects, is a pattern. One delayed project during the 2020–21 period is not evidence of anything.
5. Look at who is funding the construction
A developer funds a project from its own capital, customer collections, construction finance, or institutional equity. The mix matters to you because a project running mainly on collections stalls when sales slow, and the buyers already in it carry that risk.
Institutional investors conduct diligence you cannot: audited accounts, land title, litigation, management. Their presence is not a guarantee, but it is evidence that someone with money at stake looked properly. Urbanrise, for example, has drawn investment from ADIA, Kotak, Motilal Oswal and IndoStar, which PropIQ's independent builder review treats as one of the stronger marks in its scorecard, alongside the caveats it also records.
6. Search for litigation
Three places, all free. State RERA portals publish orders against promoters, usually searchable by name. The National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission and state commissions publish consumer orders. The e-Courts services portal covers civil matters. A large developer will have some cases; that is normal at scale. What you are looking for is a cluster of the same complaint, especially around delayed possession or refusal to refund.
7. Check the land title, separately from the project
Get the encumbrance certificate for the land and have a lawyer trace the title for the statutory period. If the land is held under a joint development agreement with a landowner rather than owned outright by the developer, read that agreement: it determines who can sign your sale deed and what happens if the two parties fall out. Agricultural land must carry a conversion order before residential construction. None of this is visible from the site office.
8. Visit the last delivered project, not the show flat
A show flat tells you what the builder can do with unlimited attention on 1,200 square feet. A four-year-old delivered project tells you what they actually do. Walk the common areas. Look at the lift lobbies, the basement drainage, the paint on the north face, the condition of the clubhouse now that the association runs it. Ask two residents the same question: what took longest to fix after handover?
9. Read the agreement before the booking amount, not after
Ask for the draft sale agreement at the enquiry stage. The clauses that matter are the ones about delay compensation, the rate at which it is paid, what counts as force majeure, the cancellation and refund terms, and whether the buyer's obligations and the builder's are penalised symmetrically. A builder who will not share the draft before you pay is telling you how the rest of the relationship will go.
10. Separate the brand from the entity
Many Indian developers build under a brand name while each project sits in a separate special purpose vehicle. The brand's reputation and the SPV's balance sheet are different things, and your agreement is with the SPV. Check the promoter name on the RERA filing against the name on your agreement. If they differ, ask why, and whether the parent gives any guarantee.
11. Then weigh the soft signals
Awards and rankings are weak evidence; most are paid or self-nominated. Press coverage of launches is weaker still. Useful soft signals are narrower: whether the construction partner is an established contractor, whether the same project team has been with the developer across multiple deliveries, and whether the builder's own sales staff will give you a straight answer about the slowest project in their portfolio.
Where PropIQ's own reviews fit
PropIQ publishes independent builder reviews compiled from RERA portals, public filings, listing portals and buyer forums, scored on a fixed scorecard. Those reviews are produced separately from this Urbanrise Insights series and are not paid for, which is why the Urbanrise review carries caveats as well as strengths. Use them as a starting point and then do the checks above yourself, because the only documents that bind anyone are the ones with your name on them.
Frequently asked questions
What is the single best check on a builder?
Occupancy certificates on past projects. A delivery claim is a marketing number; an OC is a local authority confirming that a specific building was completed to the approved plan and is fit to occupy.
How do I check if a project is RERA registered?
Ask for the registration number and search it on your state's RERA portal. Telangana uses tsrera.gov.in, Tamil Nadu rera.tn.gov.in and Karnataka rera.karnataka.gov.in. The portal also carries the approved plans, the declared completion date and quarterly progress filings.
Is a delayed project always a red flag?
No. A single delay, particularly across 2020 and 2021, tells you little. A repeated gap of two to three years between declared and actual handover across several projects is a pattern, and that is what to look for.
Does institutional investment guarantee a project will finish?
No, but it means an investor with money at stake examined the audited accounts, the title and the management with access you do not have. Treat it as corroboration, not as a guarantee.
Should I trust awards and rankings?
Treat them as weak evidence. Many industry awards are paid entries or self-nominated. The construction partner, the delivery record and the occupancy certificates say far more.
What should I ask for before paying a booking amount?
The RERA registration number, the draft sale agreement, the approved plan, the title documents or joint development agreement, and occupancy certificates for past projects. All five are reasonable requests, and the response to them is itself information.
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