Young people have long given up on the idea of home ownership–and for good reason. Once an aspiration, this adulthood milestone now seems like a faraway fantasy. The housing market appears bleaker by the day. Due to land scarcity, real estate prices in India’s metropolitan cities–Mumbai, Delhi and Bengaluru–are skyrocketing by 5-7% annually, residents packed together in shoebox homes. Millennials and Gen Zers value flexibility, mobility; to not be financially locked in paying off mortgages for the next two decades of their lives. But not owning a house does not stop them from making a home.
Even for Mumbai, India’s most expensive city, Bandra is considered costly. A rental studio apartment in this neighbourhood can easily cost INR 45,000 while a sea-view flat can go up to INR 20 lakhs. What makes this locality so appealing, especially to creatives? Is it the ‘hidden gems’ we see on Instagram, the fact that every new restaurant launches here, or the charming old-school bars that become second homes? AD India speaks to seven people willing to downsize, give up natural light, deal with noisy schools and of course, perpetually dug-up roads–just to live in Bandra. Clearly, it’s worth it.
The Ground Floor Flat With Little Natural Light
The lane outside is dug up. The colony is filled with trees. Between moving around knick-knacks and rearranging books, Ojas Kolvankar points at random objects in the room, revealing their sentimental histories: the television cover with two smiling kittens was knitted by his mother, a framed white sari was passed down from a deceased relative who used to look after him when he was a baby.
The 31-year-old moved to Bandra about seven years ago. Before this, he was renting the flat right above his current home, with a flatmate who has since moved back to his hometown. “I began looking for a smaller apartment and noticed visitors coming in and out of this house through my window,” he shares. “I immediately asked my neighbour to introduce me to the landlord.” With soft lighting, terrazzo flooring and sparse furniture, his home is evidently a refuge for someone whose job entails endless chaos. The first thing one notices is the blue walls. “It’s located on the ground floor and is a sandwich block so it doesn’t receive much natural light and doesn’t have cross-ventilation in all rooms,” the style editor admits. “Incorporating brightness through paint was important to me and I leaned towards calming blue tones.”
Kolvankar’s job is not all that keeps him rooted here. “As a queer person in my 30s, as most of my heterosexual friends get married, I have started to think about the idea of family and companionship more seriously,” he notes. “That’s why it was important to me to choose a house located close to my friends.” The building was constructed in the 1950s, so the flat requires regular upkeep but its small size makes it easier to maintain. And in a time when neighbours barely know each others’ names, Kolvankar’s check on him every evening, send him home-cooked food and share custody of the building cat Kohi.
The Creative Director Whose Alarm Clock Is A School Assembly
“Don’t say the R-word,” Mandovi Menon hushes when someone mentions redevelopment. Her Bandra building was built 60-70 years ago. The home which she has now rented for six years is spacious in a way few flats built today are. There is terrazzo flooring and an enclosed balcony which she calls her ‘writing nook.’ The moment she saw this nook, the creative confesses, she was sold.
“This was the first place I saw while house-hunting. The previous tenant told me the landlord’s handshake is a litmus test. After shaking my hand he said, ‘The home is yours if you want it.’ Whenever anything comes up with the society, it’s kind of like we are a unit,’” says the 36 year-old. She appreciates how rare this friendship is, especially after hearing Mumbai acquaintances’ rental horror stories. “His daughters are close to my age. His wife is lovely. They’ve come over and love what I’ve done with the place.”
Her mother’s table, a friend’s art–the apartment is filled with eccentric items from loved ones. Every week, Menon buys fresh flowers from a local vendor for the vases across rooms. Her elderly neighbours constantly dote on her. There is a projector in the hall for movie nights and a hobby room where she plays the piano to unwind. The creative director was keen on the space being a no-screen zone.
“For me, this home is one of the most karmically aligned, cosmic, fated situations that has ever happened,” she smiles. “Even if I made 7x the income, my first thought would not be to upgrade. I’ve never thought of leaving.” On the best days, even her alarm clock–a noisy school assembly on the ground next door–is music to her ears.
The Fashion Editor Living With Her Sex Therapist Landlord
Divya Balakrishnan moved to Mumbai in a rush after landing her dream job. While crashing with a friend, she began to look for her solo pad in Bandra, a neighbourhood she’s always loved for its sense of community. Except nothing fit her budget. “There were places that looked like people had died inside them. I once saw a carpet on the ceiling,” the 31 year-old laughs. After a month of house-hunting, she gave up: “I said fine, find me a place with a flatmate.”
Enter Aili Seghetti, an intimacy coach who purchased her home two years ago for a cat, Mimi: “I used to be on rent upstairs. When the landlady said I had to leave, I desperately started looking for a flat nearby because I didn’t want to abandon the building cat.” In a stroke of luck, the 52 year-old found that the apartment exactly below hers was for sale. She deemed this purchase a necessity: her Finnish-Italian roots meant that landlords were more tyrannical with her, quoting exorbitant rental rates while setting unreasonable rules.
A green wall of plants–so many that the window is near-impossible to shut—separates Seghetti’s home from her neighbouring Rizvi College. A group of fluffy, honking little egrets build nests on a tree visible from her kitchen window. Balakrishnan instantly connected with the space: paintings about womanhood adorn the wall, a yellow clay vulva with a bright pink clitoris is on display, several books about sex line the two bookshelves.
Of course, Seghetti’s profession has led to some interesting moments: when Balakrishnan’s mother visited her for the first time, she looked quizzically at the whip that hung by the main door. “It’s for safety!” Balakrishnan cried in a panic.
The Entrepreneur Grateful For Nicer Neighbours
Divya Saini’s neighbours from her previous rental home in Khar made life hell for tenants. “They bullied us constantly. They put up a notice saying we couldn’t have guests post 10pm, revoked our thumbprints to enter the building and morally policed us,” the stylist and founder of Bodements reveals. When she saw her current flat listed on Facebook, she instantly fell in love. “But someone had already taken it. For a whole month, it was gone, and then one day, I saw it on the market again.”
She sits by her 300-kilo Bechstein grand piano as she talks. Around her are fragile items from markets around the world, a chair designed after her thumbprint, even a skateboard from her pandemic adventures. There are butterfly artworks everywhere. Saini reveals she is obsessed with insects and has often considered attempting taxidermy. “I made the home as green as possible, like an oasis in the middle of a very hectic city,” she shares. “In every corner, you’ll see some green. The light comes in beautifully.”
But the best part, of course, is that the neighbours love her.
The Couple Who Changed Their Mind About Bandra
Raghav Goswamy and Vibhuti Jaswal never planned on living in Bandra. Until 2021, the photographer and communications consultant were in a rented Versova apartment–and loved the area’s tranquility. But when the old flat required more and more upkeep and they couldn’t find another place in Versova, their friends suggested expanding their radius. “The thing about Bandra is everyone passes through here, so it’s always busy,” Goswamy notes. “And we only had one requirement: peace.”
When the broker brought them to Pali Naka–chaotic even by Bandra standards–they were baffled. Until they entered the flat on the seventh floor. “It was unexpectedly quiet,” Goswamy remembers. No buildings blocking their view. Only the sound of parrots.
Framed above the dining table is a photo of an Allahabad beach taken by Goswamy, who was born there. A pigeon once crashed into it, mistaking it for a window, then dazedly made its way back out. Carpets and textiles from across the North-East, where Jaswal has grown up, are all over. In their guest bedroom stands a table made from a singular tree trunk from Assam. The home is the perfect amalgamation of the couple’s lives, a mosaic that represents their separate personalities–and the relationship they have built over the years. An ornate green side table bought from Delhi’s lakdi market; a couch that has been reupholstered thrice; a turntable and an enviable, ever-growing collection of vinyls.
The cherry on top of the cake is the community that accompanies this: they know every vegetable vendor by name, have seen the children in the building grow older and can walk to Soul Fry, Woodside or Carter Road’s Sunday Market any time. “Everything is here,” Jaswal grins. “Bandra is a bit like that.”
