Aditya Birla Real Estate - stock analysis

Aditya Birla Real Estate (formerly Century Textiles and Industries Ltd)

Basic brief about the company:

  • It is the property development arm of Aditya Birla group.
  • The company was previously into manufacturing of paper and textiles and in recent years pivoted to the real estate sector, divesting from its earlier businesses
  • The company operates under the brand name “Birla Estates”
  • The company has a market capitalization of Rs 16,000 crore (approx.) and its share price trades at Rs 1420
  • During the financial year the company achieved pre-sales (bookings) of approx. Rs 8000 crores with a target to take it upto Rs 15,000 cr in 3 years

I am looking at analyzing this company as a long term investment. Open to the community now, to share their analysis and thoughts on the company and the sector as a whole.

2 key specific questions which I have here:

  • Is this a right time to enter into real estate stocks, given the cyclical nature of this business and the current cycle has been there for maybe 5 years now
  • How does one really anaylze a real-estate business, given that the cash flows and profits of a project are easily spread out over multiple years. A PE or EV/EBITDA would probably not be the best metric for real estate companies. What should one really look at to understand the right valuation - Bookings, Gross Development Value (GDV), collections, etc.?