Retail Real Estate: A Legal Analysis
Symbiosis Law School, Hyderabad, India.
Karan Bansal
Symbiosis Law School, Pune, India.
Volume III – Issue I, 2021
The concept of retail sector has evolved over time and it’s not just limited to just buying and selling of goods. The concept of retail now includes marketing and distribution of goods through various channels through offline/ online modes. Due to the introduction of E- commerce in the market, some of the people still prefer to buy things directly that are fresh in hand and therefore, due to such increased competition, it is necessary for the retailers to take care of the requirement of real estate and bring modernistic changes as well as the idea to redefine retail spaces. This field requires huge establishment costs to establish retail chains such as MOM/POP stores, supermarkets, departmental stores, and malls, etc. for serving the customers and to do other activities such as warehousing, packaging, etc. Therefore, the concept of Real Estate comes into picture which helps in establishment of such chains. For example, the retail real estate captures 15% of the retail sector in India thereby playing a significant role in such industry. Therefore, both such sectors are highly interdependent on each other so as to gain profits and sever the valuable and diverse needs of the customers. Thus, there is a need of laws to govern the functioning of such industry with variety of legal aspects involved in this such as the concept of lease, E- commerce regulations for the retail real estate investors, etc. under various statutes which renders in smooth functioning of such giant retail outlets.