Newly-listed Aadhar Housing eyes over 20% growth in asset base

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Mumbai-based Aadhar Housing Finance is confident of growing its asset under management (AUM) at more than 20% this year.Rishi Anand, MD & CEO of the affordable housing finance company said there are no concerns on the demand side and it remains healthy.Aadhar Housing Finance shares were flat at debut on the exchanges on May 15. The shares listed near the issue price of ₹315 on the NSE A: One is you spoke about the demand on the lower income segment that we operate in, we typically operate in the economically weaker section (EWS) low-income group (LIG) segment. When you call out the growth in the higher segment is higher, it is because simply because of the ticket size. If you look at one of the data's of RBI in 2019, we spoke about the housing unit shortfall in the country pegged at about 10 crore housing units shortfall out of the 10 crore 9.5 crore housing shortfall comes in the EWS LIG segment where we operate.And if I were to translate that into the housing loan requirement, loan amount, it translates to about 35 trillion. So demand side I don't see an issue. Yes, we have been growing at the range of about close to about 20% on AUM, 23-24% on disbursement, ROEs are great, ROA is great. And the way the market demand is pegged at I don't see an issue at all when it comes to growth.A: If I were to compare nine months, FY22-FY23, we were at 23% FY22 we are at 24% FY23 I don't see any reason why we should take it beyond 25%. Internally the management feel that we are a housing finance company. 75-25% is the number we should be maintaining.Above all housing finance companies are regulated with a set of 60% being home loan retail on balance sheet which translate to about 75% home loan. So I think we are very comfortable maintaining 75-25 on home loan and non-home loan.A: So what has happened with us is we have expanded our geography. We were always in larger cities and larger towns. In the last one and a half years we have started moving into smaller talukas and districts where there are predominantly self-employed customers. That is one point why our self-employed segment has seen a little jump.Salaried segment, now hovering around 57-58%, self-employed definitely gives us a kicker on yield of about 350 basis points higher than what salaried customer gives him. On the risk side it gives me only a high of about 40 to 50 basis points on delinquencies. So yes, a from a pure business perspective, it makes sense to balance out both salaried and self-employed. But I think the enhancement of self-employed is happening because of the deeper impact, the deeper locations that we are getting into.A: We have been a comfortable at about 8.50-9% kind of NIMs and spreads become one of the important factors in the contribution to NIM. We are hovering around 5.50-6% on spreads and we are very comfortable maintaining that. Yes, self-employed and loan against property contribute significantly higher to your NIMs and as I guided 25% will be our non-home loans we would not want to extend beyond that. So that's the proportion we will be comfortable maintaining.A: So the way we look at it anywhere between three to four years I don't think we need to come back to the market. We have come to the market, three to four years from now there is no requirement for coming back to the market.