The True Cost of Buying a Flat in India: Every Charge Beyond the Sticker Price

The price in the brochure is the number a builder wants you to remember. The number that leaves your account is a different one. On a flat priced at ₹1 crore, two charges are fixed by law and are large: the state's stamp duty and registration fee, and, if the building is not yet complete, 5% GST. Everything else is either a market convention (brokerage), a line in the builder's cost sheet (parking, club membership, deposits) or a professional fee you negotiate (legal checks, loan processing). This page separates the three kinds so you can see which charges you can budget exactly and which you must get in writing before you pay a booking amount.

The charges, in the order you meet them

Most buyers meet the costs in this order: the agreed price, then the builder's cost sheet (which adds location, parking and club charges to the base rate), then GST on the instalments, then stamp duty and registration at the sub-registrar's office, then the lender's fees, then the society's charges on possession. A resale buyer meets a shorter list with a broker in the middle and TDS on the seller's side of the payment. The table below is the whole map; each row is explained in the sections that follow.

Stamp duty and registration: why there is no national rate

Stamp duty is a state levy and the registration fee is charged by the state's registration department. They are two separate charges with two separate rate rules, and they are paid separately at the sub-registrar's office. Both are calculated on the higher of the agreement value and the state's ready-reckoner or circle-rate value for the property, so a flat sold below the circle rate is taxed as if it sold at the circle rate. What differs by state is the rate, whether women buyers get a concession, whether a city adds its own levy on top, and whether the registration fee is capped.

The table below applies five states' published rates to a ₹1 crore flat, using the RealCostIQ stamp duty calculator's engine. The right-hand column shows the date each state's rate was last read at its own registration portal. Read the figures as the duty and fee on a flat valued at ₹1 crore for the higher of agreement value and circle rate; they exclude GST and every project-level charge.

Women-buyer concessions are narrower than the headlines

Maharashtra's order of 31 March 2021, issued by the Revenue and Forest Department, reduces stamp duty by one percentage point on a conveyance or agreement to sell of a residential unit, with effect from 1 April 2021. Its explanation clause confines the benefit to documents where women are the only purchasers. A deed that names a woman and a man as joint purchasers does not qualify. As issued, the order also barred a woman who took the concession from selling the unit to a male purchaser within 15 years of purchase. That condition has been reported as withdrawn in 2023, but we could not read the amending order at source, so a woman buying in Maharashtra should confirm the current position with the sub-registrar before relying on either reading. Our own engine does not model resale restrictions.

Delhi works differently: it publishes three rates (6% where the transferee is a man, 4% where she is a woman, 5% for a joint transfer), so a joint deed is cheaper than a sole male purchase but dearer than a sole female one. Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Telangana publish no concession by gender in the entries our engine reads, which is why the man and woman columns above are identical for them. On the ₹1 crore example, a woman buying alone saves ₹1,00,000 in Mumbai and ₹2,00,000 in Delhi against a man buying alone.

Municipal and cap rules that change the total

Three details move the figures more than most buyers expect. First, a city can add its own levy. Within the Mumbai (BMC) area, the engine adds a 1% metro cess to the stamp duty; within Pune Municipal Corporation limits it adds a 1% Local Body Tax, while Pimpri-Chinchwad and the rest of Maharashtra carry no such surcharge. Second, caps change the effective rate. Maharashtra's registration fee is 1% subject to a maximum of ₹30,000, so on a ₹1 crore flat it is ₹30,000, not ₹1,00,000. Delhi's ceiling is ₹1,00,000. Karnataka and Tamil Nadu have no ceiling, which is why registration alone is ₹2,00,000 in Bengaluru and ₹4,00,000 in Tamil Nadu on the same flat. Third, Karnataka's cess and surcharge are percentages of the duty, not of the flat's value, so they are small in rupee terms (₹60,000 together on ₹1 crore) but they are not zero.

To price your own flat, enter the state, the body, the buyer type and the higher of agreement value and circle rate into the stamp duty calculator. It separates stamp duty, surcharges and registration into the lines you will see on the receipt.

GST: 5%, 1% or nothing, depending on one date

GST on a residential flat depends on whether the building is complete when you pay. The Finance Ministry's Notification No. 11/2017-Central Tax (Rate), in the consolidated copy the GST Council publishes, as amended with effect from 1 April 2019, taxes construction services supplied by a promoter in a residential real estate project at a central rate of 0.75% for an affordable residential apartment and 3.75% for any other apartment, with the same state or union territory rate alongside. That is a headline combined rate of 1.5% and 7.5%. Paragraph 2 of the notification then deems one third of the total amount charged to be the value of the land, which is outside the tax base. Applying that deduction gives the effective rates buyers see: 1% on an affordable apartment and 5% on every other apartment, on the full agreement value you were quoted. The Finance Ministry's real estate FAQ (Part II, 14 May 2019) states the same effective rates: 1% and 5% without input tax credit.

• Affordable apartment, 1%. The notification defines it as an apartment in a project that commenced on or after 1 April 2019 (or an ongoing project where the promoter has not opted for the older rates) with a carpet area not exceeding 60 square metres in a metropolitan city or 90 square metres elsewhere, and a gross amount charged of not more than ₹45 lakh. Both conditions must hold. For GST purposes the notification lists the metropolitan cities as Bengaluru, Chennai, Delhi NCR (limited to Delhi, Noida, Greater Noida, Ghaziabad, Gurgaon and Faridabad), Hyderabad, Kolkata and Mumbai (the whole of MMR).
• Any other under-construction apartment, 5%. A ₹1 crore flat is above the ₹45 lakh ceiling in every city, so it is always in this group. 5% of ₹1,00,00,000 is ₹5,00,000.
• No input tax credit. The builder cannot claim credit on inputs and the Finance Ministry's FAQ confirms that tax at 1% or 5% is paid in cash only. That is why these rates are low and why you should be suspicious of a builder who adds GST at a higher rate on top of an all-inclusive price.
• Ready-to-move, nil. The 1% and 5% rates apply to apartments intended for sale wholly or partly, except where the entire consideration has been received after the completion certificate is issued or after first occupation, whichever is earlier. In practice a flat bought on or after completion, with the whole consideration paid after the certificate, carries no GST. The word entire matters: if any part of the price is paid before the completion certificate, the exemption does not apply to that supply.

That single date drives a large part of the total. On a ₹1 crore flat, the same property costs ₹5,00,000 more if you pay through construction than if you buy it after the completion certificate, before you look at any other charge. Under-construction flats are often priced lower per square foot than ready ones, so the comparison is not automatically in favour of ready stock, but the GST cost should be in your comparison. Use the GST on property calculator to run both cases on your own price. Note that it applies the effective rate to the full agreement value, in line with the notification, and that it estimates stamp duty at a flat 5% for context, so use the stamp duty calculator above for the state-accurate figure.

TDS under section 194-IA: a cash-flow rule, not an extra cost

Where the buyer purchases immovable property other than rural agricultural land from a resident seller, the Income Tax Department's section 194-IA requires the buyer to deduct tax at 1% of the sale consideration or the stamp duty value, whichever is higher, where that amount is ₹50 lakh or more. The buyer files and pays the deduction using a PAN, without needing a TAN. For transfers from 1 April 2026, secondary tax commentary reports that the Income-tax Act, 2025 carries the same rule at section 393(1) with the same rate and threshold; we did not read that section at source, so check the current return form with your CA.

On a ₹1 crore flat the deduction is ₹1,00,000. Importantly, this is not a charge on you: it is part of the price you owe the seller, which you deposit with the government instead of paying to the seller. You pay the seller ₹99,00,000 and deposit ₹1,00,000 as the seller's tax, which the seller claims as credit in their own return. It matters for your cash flow and your compliance, not for your total cost. The expensive mistake is paying the full price to the seller and only later finding that the deduction should have been made, so settle it before the payment, not after.

Two rules from the 2024 amendment and the engine's reading of it are worth knowing. The ₹50 lakh threshold is tested on the aggregate consideration for the property from all buyers to all sellers, not on each buyer's share, so two buyers paying ₹30 lakh each for a ₹60 lakh flat are within the rule. And where the seller is a non-resident, the rule does not apply: the buyer deducts under a different section at a different, higher rate that depends on the seller's gains, which a general calculator cannot price. If your seller lives abroad, take advice before you pay. The TDS on property calculator handles the resident-seller case and refuses the non-resident one.

Brokerage: a convention, not a rule

None of the sources read for this post sets a statutory brokerage rate. What exists is a market convention that varies by city and by who pays. The RealCostIQ broker commission engine works from a band of about 1% to 2% of the sale value per side for resale in Mumbai, Bengaluru and Pune, and about 0.5% to 1% in Delhi NCR and Gurgaon, drawn from conventions reported on the NoBroker property portal, with Chennai reported separately as 1% from the buyer and 2% from the seller. Treat these as bargaining anchors, not entitlements: the percentage is whatever you agree in writing before the broker shows you a property.

Real estate services attract GST at 18% under the same consolidated notification (Heading 9972, 9% central and 9% state), where the broker is registered. On a ₹1 crore resale at 1%, brokerage is ₹1,00,000 and GST is ₹18,000, so ₹1,18,000 in all; at 2% it is ₹2,00,000 plus ₹36,000, so ₹2,36,000. On a new launch bought directly from the developer you may pay no brokerage at all, because the developer often compensates channel partners itself. Ask before you assume, and ask for it in the booking form. The broker commission calculator lets you override the percentage with your negotiated figure and toggle the broker's GST registration.

The charges that vary by project

This section deliberately carries no rupee figures. These charges are set project by project, there is no published average that holds across India, and a figure we did not read in a source would be a guess dressed up as data. What we can do is name each charge, say what it is, and tell you where to find the number.

• Preferential location charges (PLC). A premium on the base rate for a flat with a better floor, view, corner or garden side. It is whatever the builder's cost sheet says, quoted per square foot of the area the builder prices on. Ask for the PLC schedule for the whole tower so you can see how your unit compares.
• Parking. A covered or open slot is often sold as a separate line, and in some projects it is bundled. Check whether the slot is allotted in the agreement for sale or only promised, because an unallotted slot has no deed behind it.
• Club membership and amenity charges. A one-time fee for the clubhouse and amenities, sometimes plus a refundable or non-refundable deposit. Ask whether it is optional, and whether it attracts GST on top.
• Maintenance and corpus deposits. Advance maintenance for a stated number of months and a one-time corpus or sinking fund that is handed to the society when it forms. Ask for the rate per square foot, the months covered and what happens to unspent balances.
• Society transfer fee and share certificate charges. A resale buyer pays fees to the society for recording the transfer and issuing a share certificate. Societies set these by bye-law and some are regulated by state cooperative or apartment laws, so ask the society secretary for its transfer-fee schedule and any no-objection requirements before you sign.
• Utility connection and legal documentation charges levied by the builder. Electricity meter, water and sewage connection and the builder's own drafting charges appear on possession cost sheets. These are separate from your advocate's fees and from stamp duty and registration.

Legal and due-diligence costs

Legal fees are negotiated, and we are not aware of any sourced national schedule, so none is given here. What matters more than the fee is what the work covers. For a flat, the checks that protect you are mostly checks on paper that you can start before you pay a rupee.

• Title and chain of ownership. Your advocate reads the title deeds back to a clean root, confirms the seller can sell, and checks for mortgages or litigation.
• RERA registration. Look the project up on the state RERA portal for its registration number, approved plans and promised possession date, and check the agreement for sale refers to the same carpet area.
• Approvals on the ground. For a new project, the sanctioned plan and commencement certificate; for a completed one, the occupancy certificate (OC) and completion certificate (CC). In Karnataka also check the khata. A flat without an OC may be habitable but is harder to finance and resell.
• Encumbrance certificate. The registration department issues it for a stated period of years and shows registered charges on the property.
• Draft agreement for sale. Have the advocate read the payment schedule, the delay clause and the carpet area clause before you sign, not after.

Treat the advocate's fee as a purchase of insurance, and get the scope and the fee in writing. A fixed fee for a fixed scope is easier to compare than an hourly quote.

Home-loan fees: ask for the sanction letter's schedule

Lenders charge a processing fee, usually described as a percentage of the loan or a flat amount, plus GST, and may charge for legal and technical valuation of the property. We do not give a range here because the only ranges we could find are aggregators' summaries of lenders' schedules, not the lenders' own documents or an RBI figure, and these schedules change. Use the lender's published schedule of charges, and compare the sanction letter against it.

One regulatory change is worth knowing and is sourced. The RBI's Pre-payment Charges on Loans Directions, 2025 bar prepayment charges on floating-rate loans taken by individuals for non-business purposes, whether the loan is repaid in full or in part, and take effect in 2026. Lenders must still disclose any prepayment charge on loans outside that rule, so read the key facts statement on a fixed-rate or business loan. If you are comparing loans on cost, your monthly instalment is set by the rate and tenure, which the site's home-loan EMI calculators handle better than a general explainer can.

A full worked example: a ₹1 crore flat in Mumbai and in Bengaluru

This example takes a ₹1 crore flat (₹1,00,00,000 agreement value, circle rate at or below that value), bought by a man alone, new and under construction, and compares it with the same flat bought as ready-to-move after the completion certificate. The Mumbai column uses the BMC area. The Bengaluru column uses the BBMP area and the first registration of a new flat. Every statutory line comes from the sources above and the calculator's engine. The project charges are shown as blanks because we do not know them for your flat.

Read down the Mumbai column and the statutory charges alone add ₹11,30,000 (11.3%) to the price, and the Bengaluru column adds ₹12,60,000 (12.6%). The gap of ₹1,30,000 is entirely the difference between Mumbai's capped ₹30,000 registration fee and Bengaluru's uncapped 2% fee, partly offset by Mumbai's 1% metro cess against Bengaluru's ₹60,000 cess and surcharge. Neither column includes a single rupee of project charges, brokerage, legal or loan fees, which is why a buyer who budgets only for the cost on the agreement is typically short.

Two things stand out. The completion certificate is worth ₹5,00,000 on a ₹1 crore flat, more than the entire difference between the two cities in this example. And a woman buying alone in Mumbai pays ₹1,00,000 less in duty than a man, which is small beside the GST line but larger than the registration fee. These are the lines worth negotiating around: the timing of payment, the name on the deed, and the state, if you have a choice of where to buy.

How to budget before you pay a booking amount

1. Fix the statutory block first. Run your state, body, buyer type and valuation through the stamp duty calculator and the GST calculator. These two numbers should not move unless the law does.
2. Ask for the full cost sheet in writing. It should list the base rate, the area it applies to, every PLC, parking, club, maintenance and deposit line, and the GST. Anything not on the sheet is a surprise waiting to happen.
3. Decide who pays the broker, and put it in writing. Settle the percentage and whether GST is included before you see a property.
4. Confirm TDS handling with your advisor. If the price is ₹50 lakh or more and the seller is a resident, the 1% must be deducted. If the seller is not a resident, stop and take advice.
5. Keep a contingency. The unknowns are the project charges, the legal work and the loan fees. A cushion on top of the statutory block is better than a loan top-up after possession.

What this page does not cover

This explainer covers the cost of acquiring the flat. It does not cover the capital gains a seller pays, the home-loan interest and principal deductions a buyer may claim, interiors, or recurring costs after possession such as property tax and monthly maintenance. It also does not include state-specific exceptions beyond the five states above, including stamp duty concessions on affordable housing schemes and state-level rebates that change by notification. For any of these, check the state's registration department or a chartered accountant.