Elan Mercado

Mercado is one of the few commercial projects on this list you can visit today and see working. Elan has completed it on NH-48 (old NH-8) in Sector 80, on about 2.99 acres of licensed land, and the occupation certificate was issued on 17 October 2022. It is registered under RERA, registration number HARERA Regn. No. 189 of 2017. You can check it on the state RERA portal before booking.

The complex combines high-street retail in double-height shops with a food court, restaurants, a 4-screen PVR multiplex and a block of service apartments. Those service apartments matter, because they add built-in footfall on top of the shoppers who drive in.

The site sits on the Delhi-Jaipur highway at the southern end of the New Gurugram sectors, with direct shop frontage on NH-48. Sectors 76 to 82 around it have a dense residential population, so there are plenty of families within a short drive who need a place to eat, shop and catch a film. Being right on the highway also gives the complex visibility to traffic heading between Delhi, Gurgaon and Manesar, which is valuable for food and quick-service brands in particular. The developer puts IMT Manesar about 5 minutes away, and the area is connected to the Dwarka Expressway and Golf Course Extension Road.

The brands shown on the project page include PVR, KFC, Pizza Hut, Domino's, Costa Coffee and Bikanervala, which gives you a sense of the tenant mix. On the practical side the building has what you want in an operating mall: air conditioning, lifts, car parking, power backup, CCTV and 24x7 security, plus the food court and multiplex that keep people coming in.

Retail shops on file come in at about 270 sq.ft, about 350 sq.ft and about 400 sq.ft. Indicative prices start around ₹45.76 lakh. Inventory and pricing change, so NRIVEST can confirm the latest with the developer.

For an NRI who doesn't want to wait years for a building to come up, a ready, operating mall removes a lot of uncertainty. You can see the tenants, the footfall and the condition of the building before you decide, and the ticket size is modest for commercial property.

The key is to judge each unit on its own merits, not the mall as a whole. Ask whether the shop is already let, to whom, at what rent and for how long, and where it sits relative to the PVR and food court. Also confirm the OC and title documents carefully before you pay.

Elan is a Gurugram developer that made its name with retail and commercial projects before moving into big-ticket housing, so Mercado is very much in its home territory.