What Does a RERA-Approved Plot Actually Prove?
- RERA-approved plots near Mumbai is a phrase sellers use loosely. Registration attaches to a project, and it is granted on what the promoter declares.
- The Real Estate (Regulation and Development) Act, 2016 requires a promoter to register a project before advertising, marketing or selling it.
- Registration does not examine your title. It does not certify the chain of ownership, and it never has.
- The registration number is only useful once you open the project page it resolves to and read the survey numbers listed there.
- If the survey number you are being sold is not on that page, you are buying something adjacent to the registered project.
- Four checks sit outside RERA entirely: the record of rights, the holder’s account, the register of pending entries and the conversion order.
Almost every plotted layout marketed around Mumbai describes itself as RERA-approved, and the phrase does real work in a buyer’s mind that the registration itself does not do. It sounds like a certificate of soundness. In practice a registration number is an index entry, not a certificate, and it is closer to a filing. Understanding exactly what it covers is the difference between a useful check and false comfort.
Terms used on this page
Promoter is the person or company developing and selling the project.
Registration is the entry a promoter makes with the authority before selling.
Satbara is the 7/12 extract: the village record of rights for one parcel.
Khatedar is the person recorded as holding the land.
Mutation is the entry that records a change of holder in the record of rights.
Gat number is the group survey number given to a holding after consolidation.
Layout is the sanctioned plan that divides a parcel into plots and roads.
What does a RERA-approved plot actually prove?
It covers the project, and the Real Estate (Regulation and Development) Act, 2016 requires that registration before a promoter advertises, markets or sells.
The authority receives what the promoter declares: the land details, the layout, the promoter’s own particulars and a timeline. It then publishes that declaration.
Publication is the point. A registered project has a page on the authority’s own portal, and that page is a record of what the promoter has committed to in writing. If the promoter later says something different in a meeting, the page is the version that counts.
What the authority does not do is investigate your seller’s title. It is a regulator of promoters and projects, not a registrar of ownership.
Why is the registration number itself nearly useless?
Because a number on a brochure carries no information until it resolves, and on 23 September 2026 the only way to resolve one is the authority’s own project search.
A number can be mistyped, belong to a different phase, or belong to a project that shares a promoter but not this land.
Look it up yourself rather than accepting a screenshot. Then read three things on the page: the promoter name, the survey or gat numbers listed against the project, and the declared completion date. Those three compared against what you have been told will resolve most of the ambiguity in a plotted sale.
The most common gap we see is not fraud. It is a genuine registered project sitting beside unregistered land, with both being shown to buyers on the same site visit.
| Question | Does RERA answer it? | What answers it |
|---|---|---|
| Is the project declared to a regulator? | Yes | The project page itself |
| Which survey numbers are in the project? | Yes, as declared | The land details on the page |
| Who is the promoter, and what else have they registered? | Yes | The promoter record |
| Is the title to those survey numbers clean? | No | The record of rights and the deed chain |
| Is there a pending or disputed mutation? | No | The mutation register |
| Is the land lawfully non-agricultural? | No | The conversion order |
| Does the seller hold other undisclosed parcels here? | No | The holder’s account register |
What should you check on the project page?
Six things, in this order, because each one narrows the next under the Real Estate (Regulation and Development) Act, 2016 framework.
The sequence matters. Confirming the project exists at all, before checking whether your particular plot sits inside it, saves you a wasted afternoon on site.
- Resolve the number on the authority’s own portal. Not a PDF, not a screenshot in a brochure. If the number does not resolve, stop there and ask why.
- Match the promoter name to the entity on your paperwork. A related company is not the same company, and the contract will be with whoever signs it.
- Read the survey and gat numbers listed as project land. Write them down. This is the list your plot has to be inside.
- Compare that list against the parcel you are being shown. Walk the site with the numbers in hand rather than accepting a pointed finger.
- Read the declared completion date. A plotted layout still has committed infrastructure, and the date is the promoter’s own statement about it.
- Check what else the promoter has registered. The record shows their other projects, which is the quickest reputation check available to you.
Registration tells you a promoter filed something. It does not tell you the land is theirs to sell. Those are different questions and only one of them is answered on the portal.
Girish Chhalwani, Co-Founder, Lords of the Lands
What sits outside RERA entirely?
Title, and the record of rights that section 148 of the Maharashtra Land Revenue Code, 1966 requires to be maintained in every village is where it starts.
That record tells you what the land legally is and who is recorded on it. Nothing on a RERA page substitutes for it.
Three more sit alongside it. The holder’s account register shows every parcel standing to that person in the village, which is how undisclosed adjacent holdings surface. The mutation register shows entries made but not yet certified, which is the gap between what the record says today and what is actually being argued about. And the conversion order shows whether the land may lawfully be built on at all.
None of those four is difficult to obtain. They are simply a different errand from checking a registration number, and buyers who do the easy one often skip the others.
Frequently asked questions
Does RERA registration mean the title is clear?
No. Registration means the project has been declared to the authority before being advertised or sold. Title comes from the chain of registered documents and the record of rights, neither of which the authority examines.
Do plotted layouts need to be registered at all?
A plotted development is caught by the same registration requirement once it crosses the statutory thresholds. If a seller tells you a layout is exempt, ask which threshold they are relying on and check that claim rather than accepting it.
What if my plot is not listed on the project page?
Then it is not in the registered project, whatever you have been told on site. You may still be able to buy it, but you are buying unregistered land and the protections you were counting on do not attach to it.
Is a registration number on a brochure enough?
No. Resolve it yourself on the authority’s portal. A number printed on marketing material proves only that someone printed it.
Can a registration be for a different phase?
Yes, and this is common on larger layouts. Phases are registered separately, so confirm the registration you were given covers the phase containing your plot rather than an earlier one.
What is the single most useful thing on the page?
The list of survey and gat numbers. Everything else is context; that list is the test of whether the plot you are standing on is actually part of what was registered.
Been shown a registration number for a plot in Karjat or Khopoli? Send us the number and the survey number, and we will tell you whether they belong to each other.
Related reading
Verify the project and the paperwork
- How to verify title before buying a plot – the search RERA does not do for you.
- Verifying a plotted layout’s RERA – matching your plot to the registered project.
- Checking a MahaRERA number and its QPR – how to read what the portal shows.
- The title-check checklist – the documents to pull, in order.
- How a land sale is registered in Maharashtra – the step that actually transfers ownership.
Records and NA status
- How to read a 7/12 extract – the record of rights, line by line.
- The Other Rights column on the 7/12 – where restrictions hide.
- What NA land actually means – the status you are buying into.
- The one-time NA premium – what conversion now costs.
- Is an NA Sanad still required? – the 2026 position.
- NA permission scrapped: what changed – the reform explained.
- Deemed NA on plan approval – when conversion is automatic.
- Class 1 vs Class 2 tenure – which land transfers freely.
Build, access and shortlist
- Getting building permission for a plot – the approval after you own it.
- Getting water and power to a plot – the utilities question.
- The nine criteria we shortlist a plot against – our own filter.
- Khopoli-Pali road land in 2026 – a corridor where these checks apply.
- What a villa plot includes – and what it leaves to you.
From Lords of the Lands
- Decoding land: how a parcel is assessed before we buy it
- Ongoing projects in the Karjat and Khopoli belt
- The types of plotted development we build
- Talk to Lords of the Lands about a parcel
Citations and sources
- MahaRERA — the authority’s own project search, where a registration number resolves to a project page carrying the promoter, land details and declared timeline.
- Maharashtra Land Revenue Code, 1966 — section 148, the record of rights maintained in every village.
