property market heats up after yearsafter years of ailing the real estate sector finally got back on its feet over the last 12 months as 17800 homes flew off the shelves across hyderabad even as a fresh stock of 16500 units hit the local market prices too saw a significant escalation of 715 per cent on an average while the citys housing segment witnessed one of the highest growth across india the commercial sector too touched new heights as hyderabad raced ahead to end only behind bengaluru in office space leasing as per the market data the western corridor saw a staggering 75 million square feet of office space being leased out by bigticket multinational companies such as microsoft facebook qualcomm etc most of these firms hired anywhere between one and six lakh square feet even retail saw hectic activity with brands picking up space in malls between 20000 and 75000 square feet on an average while things looked dull on the rera real estate regulatory authority front during the initial months of the year the state eventually launched its website in august bringing all projects rolled out on or before january 1 2017 under its purview in fact earlier this month the authorities even issued notices to about 40 developers who are yet to register under rera aimed at securing the interest of buyers and warned of levying a heft penalty of rs 1 lakh in case of any further delaymany firsts for city airporton its 10th birthday the citys rajiv gandhi international airport rgia recorded a staggering 189 million annual passenger footfall january to november a massive 22 per cent jump over the last year source aai as the crowds swelled and the facility got into expansion mode an interim international departures terminal came up near the haj terminal fitted with a host of latest technologies including indias first ever remote hand baggage screening facility under digiyatra rgia also became the first airport in the country to initiate face recognition trials taking a step towards paperless travel that once rolled out will allow registered fliers to walk through all check points without any id proofs the year also saw a slew of new connections launched between the city facility and other domestic destinations calicut hubli amritsar vadodara port blair udaipur dehradun imphal kolhapur kannur as airline operators enhanced their fleet sizes flynas also made a debut landing at rgia this year existing connectivity to places such as bangkok riyadh also increased what came as a dampener though were two back to back reports of trainer aircraft crashes in the month of november while one of them involved an indian air force plane the other belonged to the citys rajiv gandhi aviation academy in both cases preliminary enquiry suggested a technical glitch as the reason for the mishaproad breather for civiliansin a landmark development the longpending prayer of civilians living in and around the secunderabad cantonment area was finally answered in