Real estate-focused advisory and investment firm Certus Capital, led by former KKR & Co. director Ashish Khandelia, said Friday it has backed a residential project in Mumbai.
Certus said it invested Rs 80 crore (around $9.7 million) in Aakasa, which is being developed by Techno Group, Fortune Realty and Gala in Mumbai’s Worli area. The project has a revenue potential of about Rs 350 crore, it said in a statement. The money will be used for construction of the project.
Certus made this bet through its secured fixed-income investment platform Earnnest.me, which allows individuals, wealthy people, family offices and financial institutions to participate in the firm’s real estate deals.
“Real estate credit is our highest conviction theme at the moment driven by the robust rebound in residential sector and lack of capital availability,” said Khandelia, founder of Certus Capital and Earnnest.me.
This is at least the second transaction that Certus has sealed within six months. In November last year, Certus invested around Rs 30 crore in Mumbai residential project Eon One.
Earlier, the firm had invested about Rs 40 crore via its platform in a mid-market residential project being developed by Pune-based real estate development firm Pharande Spaces.
Certus was founded in 2018 and targets to close real estate deals valued over Rs 500 crore in a year. As for its neo-financing platform, Earnnest.me, it claims to have over 300 investors on-board, seeing a 50% repeat rate.
Mint had earlier reported that the firm was planning to launch its first category-II alternative investment fund this year. The real estate fund will be credit-focused and look at an initial corpus of Rs 500 crore.
