Summary of this article
Pooja Gowda bought a Rs 60 lakh flat in Shahad without a home loan.
She saved Rs 19 lakh and paid Rs 34 lakh through monthly builder installments.
Incentives helped fund payments, while interiors took total expenditure to Rs 70 lakh.
Buying a house without taking a home loan can be challenging especially when it involves a substantial financial commitment. Now, Pooja Gowda, a digital creator from Maharashtra, who currently works as a senior manager at a fintech company, has shared the strategy she followed to purchase a flat in Shahad without borrowing from a bank.
In a video post on Instagram, Gowda shared how she saved for the downpayment and negotiated an instalment arrangement with the builder to pay the remaining amount.
How She Paid The Remaining Rs 42 Lakh Without A Home Loan
Gowda said the flat cost Rs 60 lakh, including car parking, floor-rise charges, registration and Goods and Services Tax (GST). After arranging a downpayment of Rs 18 lakh, she had to pay the remaining Rs 42 lakh. She initially considered taking a home loan, but discussed an alternative with her father and approached the builder. Since construction had just started, the builder agreed to accept payments in instalments as the project progressed.
Gowda said dividing Rs 42 lakh over 36 months would have required monthly payments of around Rs 1.16 lakh-1.17 lakh. She negotiated to pay Rs 1 lakh every month, with the remaining Rs 8 lakh due at possession.
She said, “I told the builder that I could pay Rs 1 lakh every month. The builder agreed, and the remaining Rs 8 lakh would have to be paid at the time of possession.” She said she paid Rs 34 lakh through 34 monthly instalments between September 2022 and June 2025, with the remaining Rs 8 lakh payable at possession.
How She Saved For The DownPayment
Gowda said she saved approximately Rs 19 lakh between May 2019 and August 2022. This included Rs 4 lakh in the first year, Rs 5.50 lakh in the second year and Rs 9.50 lakh in the third year. She used Rs 18 lakh towards the downpayment and kept Rs 1 lakh as an emergency fund. To manage her savings, she maintained two bank accounts, one for receiving her salary and meeting regular expenses and another, which she called her ‘Dream Account’, exclusively for savings.
Gowda added: “As soon as your salary is credited, keep around 10-15 per cent for monthly expenses and transfer the remaining amount to your Dream Account. There should be no debit card, credit card or digital payment application linked to this account. Money should only go into it, not come out.”
Gowda worked in B2C edtech sales for five years and said she earned average monthly incentives of Rs 1 lakh-1.50 lakh over and above her salary. She said these incentives helped her manage the builder payments and save towards the final amount.
She spent another Rs 9 lakh-10 lakh on interiors, taking the overall expenditure to approximately Rs 69 lakh to Rs 70 lakh. Her family also retained its previous house, renovated it and rented it out.
