HCN: What are the businesses you have right now?
SURAJ MORAJKAR: We have now altogether three companies. One is the real estate company for last 21 years which is primarily catering to construction of homes. We have a boutique hotel, Sol de Goa, which offers a very exclusive holiday for tourists. We have another company which is now building an up-scale luxury hotel called Soham Leisure Ventures. As far as the real estate is concerned it is catering to certain clientele who understand Goa. Sol de Goa caterers basically to clients who want to have their private exclusive holidays. This hotel was an experiment with Tarun Tahiliani who came and designed it. And the third one, Soham Leiture Ventures is more of a high-end hospitality company that is catering to people who will be using that on a large scale for weddings and events.
HCN: How is the real estate market in Goa doing?
SM: Well if you do things rightly, you will get the right results. I feel as a developer, if you do things which cater to the right community, apply your mind and do not just build for sake of building it, it’s fine. I feel pity for those people who come with a city mentality to Goa and they want to develop certain things. In my opinion they must study Goa. They must not encroach on architecture. They must try and blend everything and then they will start getting the results. I have been trying this for the last 21 years and fortunately we have been lucky as people buy homes from us.
HCN: What kind of clientele are you looking at? Why should one buy your product?
SM: My client is anybody who understands the product I am doing. Anybody who is an entrepreneur, anybody who is a CEO of a company, who is an industrialist, to guys who may be having a minimum salary but they understand the kind of feel we give in the house. Well, I feel you should buy my home as it will invite you back as it emits a lot of energy, style and offers you the best views with great proportions. And in terms of the home, I give you Goa.
HCN: Are you looking at the retired people, second home buyers or new buyers?
SM: We have homes which will cater to people who can basically pay the EMIs. We have launched a product where the house is paying for itself. You pay 50 per cent and 50 per cent the hotel operator will give. It’s a product we have launched. This product is more like, you pay 25 per cent of the value and 25 per cent you pay over a period of construction and the balance 50 per cent is paid by the hotel operator which is tied up with a leading hotel chain in the world who is going to operate this hotel. This is a new hotel very close to Hotel Taj Aguada and a walking distance from the beach so that is also for people who wants to put up money in the FD they could put up there so after 5 year to 10 years they can encash it, which will be 3 or 4 times the value.
HCN: Do you think the new generation clients are interested in old styled buildings?
SM: Well, I sometimes feel sorry, lot of my fellow Goan brothers who go abroad to work come back and destroy their old homes to build the most monstrous homes. If you look at those homes after another 5 years it will be in a very bad shape. So my request to every young Goan or whoever understands Goa, is not to break any of their old homes. This is the beauty of Goa. As far as people’s interest is concerned, anybody coming to Goa comes here to get the feel of Goa and not for anything else. Buildings are everywhere and in all cities across India. Even if you are building, I feel that you should carefully try it to place it into the right kind of profiling so that it does not look like a slab of concrete and this the biggest challenge what Goa faces today.
HCN: What measures have you taken to educate them to protect the heritage? How do you compete with people who build modern styled properties?
SM: Well the new generation is looking for homes and hotels which is cutting-edge design and I think it is not a bad thing. But I feel that the basic tenets of architecture styles must be maintained and continued in Goa. Competition wise, I feel they would do more business if they really blend with Goa because that is precisely the reason why people visit Goa. People love to buy homes even before we build them. We are not just building it we put a lot of careful thought into it.
HCN: How do you see business in the real estate space during this slump?
SM: Well last 20 months was challenging for the industry with lots of uncertainities. People bought homes and were unable to make payments. Good developers survived and fly by night operators have shut closed. But since we had our legacy of 21 years we survived. We did have a little impact but we were lucky that our products spoke for ourselves and we gave results. Everybody has the right to do business, but they must show their sentiments and protect the profile and culture of Goa.
HCN: How do you see the tourism industry growing?
SM: This industry is like a goose which lays you golden eggs. We should come forward and understand what we are facing and what we will face? Currently I have seen lot of write-ups in newspapers on garbage management and I have started taking initiatives in my village. To make all the locals aware that we should be more responsible as Goa is a tourist State giving us our daily bread.
We have the shack owners, taxi drivers associations, hotel owners associations, travel and tourism associations. We have to come under one umbrella and discuss all our problems together. Hopefully in the next season we should have a board where we should bring up all our issues on one table. Secondly, we have taxi association friends and I always wanted them to do well. Maybe we can educate them on how to get better business with less complaints from the tourists. The government should constitute a board and once the board comes, some of our problems will get resolved, to get to welcome tourists. It is all about us. At the end of the day, I think every Goan is a brand ambassador in this game of tourism.
