First-Time Home Buyer Guide — India 2026

RBI's actual LTV ceilings — not the 20/25/35% rule of thumb

RBI's own Master Circular on housing finance sets the loan-to-value ceiling banks may lend against, by loan size: "Upto ₹ 30 lakh...90 [%]...Above ₹ 30 lakh & upto ₹ 75 lakh...80 [%]...Above ₹ 75 lakh...75 [%]". That means the minimum down payment RBI's rule implies is 10% up to ₹30 lakh, 20% for ₹30–75 lakh, and 25% above ₹75 lakh — a bank can ask for more, but 90/80/75% LTV is the regulatory ceiling on how little you can put down, not a target. Budgeting a flat 20–35% down payment across the board understates what a bank is permitted to lend on a smaller property and overstates the minimum on a larger one.

The same circular also settles what counts as "property cost" for this calculation: "banks should not include stamp duty, registration and other documentation charges in the cost of the housing property they finance", with one exception — "where the cost of the house/dwelling units does not exceed Rs.10 lakh, bank may add stamp duty [and registration] to the cost" for LTV purposes. On any flat above ₹10 lakh, budget stamp duty and registration entirely on top of your down payment — the loan will not stretch to cover them.

Which projects must be RERA-registered before Step 4 even applies

The RERA-check step in the process table above assumes the project is RERA-registered. Some legally are not: the Act exempts a project where "the area of land proposed to be developed does not exceed five hundred square meters or the number of apartments proposed to be developed does not exceed eight inclusive of all phases". A small standalone building can fall entirely outside RERA's registration requirement — which means there is no RERA registration number to check, and the RERA-linked protections this guide and the RERA buyer rights guide describe (delay interest, refund rights, document access) do not attach to that specific project through the RERA authority. If a builder cannot produce a registration number for a project of this size, that may be the reason, not necessarily a red flag on its own — but it changes which law governs your purchase agreement.

GST on the flat price — and the one condition that removes it entirely

An under-construction flat carries GST that a completed, ready-to-move flat does not. The current rate structure, per the GST Council's own rate notification, taxes affordable residential construction (carpet area and price within the government's affordable-housing definition) at an effective 1% and other residential construction at 5%, both without input tax credit, "paid in cash only". The exemption trigger is specific and worth knowing before you negotiate possession timing: construction is taxable as a supply of services "except where the entire consideration has been received after issuance of completion certificate, where required, by the competent authority or after its first occupation, whichever is earlier". In practice: if you pay the full price only after the completion certificate is issued (or first occupation, whichever comes first), GST does not apply to that purchase at all — the same flat can be GST-free simply because of when you paid for it relative to completion, not because of anything about the flat itself.

Stamp duty: two states, two different answers to the same question

The upfront-costs table above gives a 3–9% range for stamp duty "varies by state and buyer gender" — worth seeing concretely rather than as an abstraction. Kerala's Registration Department states conveyance duty flatly at "8 rupees for every Rs.100 or part thereof of the fair value or value of consideration whichever is higher" — 8% — plus a further "2% of the fair value or consideration" registration fee, for a combined 10%, with no gender-based split in this rate table. Uttar Pradesh's own published Schedule, by contrast, states only base rupee slabs for its conveyance article and explicitly defers the operative percentage rate to a separate reduction notification — the schedule itself contains no rupee-value ceiling and no women's stamp-duty concession anywhere in its text — UP's women's rate is set by a separate order instead: notification no. 13/2025/914/94-2-2025-700(76)/2024 of 29 July 2025 charges a woman 6% rather than 7% where the value is ₹1 crore or less, and the full 7% above it. Do not assume a women's concession applies in every state, or that it is uncapped where it does — check your specific state's calculator on this site rather than a single India-wide percentage.