ISLAMABAD – Pakistan has been placed at 75th spot with a score of 3.99 in the biannual Global Real Estate Transparency Index (GRETI) 2018 report released on Thursday.
In the newly released report link> by property consultancy firm JLL, the South Asian country is placed in the “low transparency tier,” behind Iran that sits at 74th spot. Meanwhile, United Kingdom has claimed the top spot in 2018, with a composite score of 1.24.
Pakistan made significant progress, as it jumped up 15 positions to 75th in 2018 compared to 88th in 2016 when South Asia’s first REIT had pushed the country into the “low transparency” category.
“Saudi Arabia and Pakistan have also seen rising transparency over the past two years, with regulatory reforms and increased data collection and publication by government bodies and international market participants contributing to their progress,” stated the report.
Furthermore, neighboring India too made impressive leap this year and was placed at 35th spot, with composite score of 2.7.
“India is the most notable member of this group, ranking among the most improved markets in the Index. The country continues to make incremental progress up the rankings thanks to proactive government efforts to transform the real estate industry. Ambitious new initiatives – most notably, the Real Estate Regulation (and Development) Act (2016) – have gone hand in hand with soaring investor demand,” stated the report.
As per the report’s key findings from the 2018 survey, the average transparency scores posted 2.4 percent improvement.
“Globally, steady progress is being made – with 85% of markets showing an improvement in the two years since the last Index. However, there is a feeling that the rising expectations of investors, occupiers and the general public are outstripping the real rate of change,” revealed the report.
This 10th edition of the Global Real Estate Transparency Index (GRETI) contains the most comprehensive country comparisons of data availability, governance, transaction processes, property rights and the regulatory/legal environment around the world.
The 2018 Index covers 100 countries and 158 city markets, and the number of individual factors covered has increased by 36% to 186 factors.