Exotica - Nothin' exotic about it

Review On Renaissance Holdings, Bangalore

Mouthshut is known for rumors & grapevines.

While it is true, it never actually came close to giving products their true value. Most did try to give an accurate description of the product be it a shaving blade to a car, though the description always remained incomplete. Besides you also had a few artificially pegging their products as the builder community/marketing teams did here. The star rating has always been totally inaccurate in the case of the builder community. With the addition of copycat features - both twitter like  youtube like, what exactly does the idiot managing the site think he is doing? He needs to decide if he wants to be a youtube, a twitter or just a review site. No, the joker neither has the resources nor is he innovative enough to add a farmville to keep member's interest. The site is cluttered worse than a garbage bin. Looking at the reviews for the past week, I hardly see anyone actually read the reviews. Why am I even wasting my time at this site?

Anyways, ample time can make any dunderhead a genius. So while I review this purchase of mine, I doubt it would be read. I am referring to my flat purchase at Renaissance Exotica. It is a joint venture between Landholders – Ranka Developers & Builders – Renaissance Holdings. I came to know about it after a 3 year hunt & when I did purchase it, the project was already delayed by 2 years. Though guesstimating the final status, I expect it to be handed over for interior by 15th of June. While delays are the most common irritants to us consumers, since we need to maneuver our EMIs, the builder community is not exactly a stickler for rules. Besides people purchasing their first homes also need to pay rent on current residences. What we would appreciate any builder is to give an accurate timeline for completion of the project, pending which immediate intimation on the delays in the project would be critical to avoid dissatisfaction. This would definitely help reschedule our payments and other timelines in our miniscule lives. Not just Renaissance, others too lack in this department, the worst being Shobha and Puravankara.  Delays are of course expected & normal in any building project, but without accurate info, it can get frustrating to cope with the rescheduling. Besides if the delay exceeds 2 years, it does throw a spanner in our planning. 3% of your life has been thrown out of gear, due to someone not setting your expectations right. Almost all the projects I have visited have been delayed due to the recession by more than an year firstly due to the high cost of material at the time and suddenly the lack of any demand for housing thereafter. Even if the builders offered to take care of one emi for every year’s delay, it would make a difference to our salaried lives.

However, the delays by ALL the builders has mostly been due to the recessionary effect and the subsequent tightening of credit. This is understandable, but these guys need to understand that the consumer too is affected.

Having said that, my hunt for an ideal home didn’t sound ideal because it is an apartment flat. And I have this recurring nightmare after watching Bollywood movies - what if the building fell down? I am no longer left with a home, but a tiny patch of land. Nothing like an independent home to call your own!

Renaissance Exotica is located on Airport road, half a km from the road split between Yelahanka road & airport road, (the signal right after Jakkur airfield), you enter the service road to the right for half a km & take a right. Another half a km away inside is the project. Reaching the airport is a breeze from this location. Would take you 10 mins to reach Mekhri circle with 8.6 kms on the ring road with three signals in between. Increasing pressure from the existing owners, they are in a hurry to handover flats by end of this month. Looking at its timelines and completion stage, I would give it a  month for flats to be handed over to owners, while it would still take around an year for the amenities, roads and other inclusions made by the builder. Mind you, the builder has already crimped on costs. We were initially shown a very large swimming pool and all we get now is around 2500 sq ft of pool area for an apartment consisting of around 250 flats.

3BHK consist of a minimum of 1719 sqft(upto 1730 sqft) with a gracious view of the Jakkur airfield on one side and row villas located on the other side. Priced around 60 lakhs, I expect you to visit the site & form your own opinion. These apartments are lowrise due to their proximity to the airfield. The apartment consists of all things provided – clubhouse, pool, amphitheater just to name a few. With around 240+ flats, the maintenance cost is expected to average around 2 rupees/ sq foot in a few years time. The only standout feature is the atria parks.

Bad points - The architect has not focused on Vaastu. These days, it is heartening to note that even the Muslim community adheres to Indian Vaastu concepts such as adequate lighting and air. And while that is excellent in the flats, there are fewer flats with North or East entrances. Most flats have West & South entrances. Bad on construction with the walls being extremely flimsy. The swimming pool, the clubhouse & others which were promised were reduced in size to less than half of what was shown in the original plan.

The plans are the worst. The architects RSP architects have done it again with their box copy of flats by changing sides of each flat. All the projects of RSP are the worst designed, unsustainable models. Execution of any project requires a good design, meaning you require a very good architect in the planning stage. Without them, the building project is bound to suck bad.! Period.

If you have a leakage, no fear, it will leak to the bathroom of the flat in the floor below you. Any changes, only need to be made to the piping after the flat owner below you complains of it.(You will not even hear of the leaks) Thus, your problem appears transferred to the flatowner below you! On the plus side, this method does not involve breaking of the floor and thus would avoid recurring leaks, a common problem in apartments.  The flat owner beneath you would have a false ceiling around 3 feet which would hide the piping from above along with the water heaters for your ba

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