Stamp duty and registration are the largest costs in an Indian property purchase that no one quotes you. They are not part of the price, they are not usually part of the loan, they are payable in a single lump at the moment of registration, and on a high-value home they run to a figure most buyers are startled by the first time they see it. Getting them into your budget at the start rather than at the sub-registrar's office is the entire point of this page.

Everything below describes Karnataka's system as we could verify it, with the sources named. Rates and slabs are changed by government notification and have changed recently. Confirm the current position with the Department of Stamps and Registration or your advocate before you commit money — do not budget from a web page, including this one.

Two Different Charges, Often Confused

Stamp duty is a tax on the instrument — the sale deed itself — levied under the Karnataka Stamp Act. Paying it is what makes the document legally valid and admissible in evidence. Registration fee is a separate charge under the Registration Act, 1908, paid for the act of recording the transaction in the public register at the sub-registrar's office. You pay both, they are calculated separately, and they go to different heads.

Two further items ride on top of the stamp duty rather than on the property value: a cess and a surcharge, each computed as a percentage of the stamp duty amount, with the surcharge differing between urban and rural jurisdictions. They are small individually and they do move the total.

The Current Rates

Karnataka charges stamp duty on a slab basis by the value of the property. The structure as published by lender and industry sources is 2% below ₹20 lakh, 3% between ₹20 lakh and ₹45 lakh, and 5% above ₹45 lakh. Any villa in this project's price band falls in the top slab.

The registration fee was revised from 1% to 2% of property value with effect from 31 August 2025 — the first change to it since 2003 — and applies to residential, commercial and plotted transactions alike. That single change adds a full one per cent of the property value to every purchase in the state, which on a high-value home is not a rounding error.

Cess is around 10% of the stamp duty amount, with a surcharge of about 2% of stamp duty in urban and BBMP areas and about 3% in rural areas. Adding it up, industry summaries put the total statutory outlay on a property above ₹45 lakh at roughly 7.5% to 7.6% of the assessed value. Treat that as an order of magnitude for budgeting and get the exact figure computed on your own document.

What They Are Charged On

Not on what you agreed to pay, necessarily. Duty is assessed on the higher of the actual consideration and the government's guidance value for that property. Guidance value is the state's own minimum benchmark rate, fixed area by area and revised periodically, and it exists to stop transactions being under-declared.

Two consequences follow. If your negotiated price is above guidance value, duty is on your price. If guidance value has recently been revised upward past your agreed price, duty is on the guidance value regardless of what you actually paid. Check the current guidance value for the exact survey number before you model the cost — not the value for the locality generally.

Kaveri Online Services

Karnataka's registration system runs on Kaveri Online Services (now Kaveri 2.0), operated by the Department of Stamps and Registration at kaveri.karnataka.gov.in. It is the portal to know, and not only at the moment of registration.

• Stamp duty and valuation calculation — compute duty and fees on a proposed transaction before you sign anything.
• Guidance value lookup — the department's own benchmark rate for a location, which is the figure your duty will actually be assessed against.
• Encumbrance Certificate (EC) — the record of registered charges and transactions against a property. Pull this yourself for the survey numbers involved; it is the cheapest piece of due diligence there is.
• Certified copies of registered documents — including past sale deeds in the chain of title.
• E-stamping and payment, and appointment booking at the sub-registrar's office.

The same portal is also the best independent check on a corridor's real price level. Registered transaction records show what nearby property actually changed hands for — a very different thing from what a listing portal says sellers are asking.

Why These Fall Outside the Quoted Price

A developer quotes the consideration for the property. Stamp duty and registration are statutory charges payable by the buyer to the state, not to the developer, and no builder in India includes them in a headline figure. At Nambiar Beverly Park this is stated explicitly: registration and stamp duty are excluded from the quoted price, which starts at an indicative ₹5.48 Cr. On a purchase in that band the statutory stack is a substantial additional sum in its own right, and it is due in cash at registration.

One clarification specific to this project, because it is a common confusion: the quoted figure already includes the development and infrastructure charge and 5% GST. Those are not additional. Stamp duty and registration are.

Why Your Home Loan Will Not Cover Them

This is the part that catches people out. Under the Reserve Bank of India's loan-to-value framework for housing loans, the value of the property for LTV purposes must exclude stamp duty, registration and other documentation charges. The only exception is for houses costing up to ₹10 lakh, where banks may add them in. At any price band above that — and certainly at this one — the statutory charges are outside the funded amount.

So the arithmetic on a high-value purchase is: your own contribution is the down payment plus the entire statutory stack, in cash, at registration. Budget the two together or you will be short at exactly the wrong moment.

Practical Points

• Get the calculation done on your specific document before you sign, using Kaveri or your advocate. Slab boundaries, guidance value and the urban/rural surcharge all turn on specifics.
• Duty is payable on other instruments too, not only the sale deed — an agreement to sell, a gift, a lease above a certain term and a power of attorney all attract their own duty. Ask what the full document set for your transaction will cost, not just the deed.
• Rates change by notification. The registration fee doubled in 2025 with limited notice. Reconfirm before you transact.
• Keep the registered documents. They are your title, and you will need certified copies for any future sale, loan or mutation.

For how the statutory charges fit alongside the villa price and the other cost heads, see the Nambiar Beverly Park price page. More buying and due-diligence guides are indexed on the Nambiar Beverly Park blog.

This page is general information about Karnataka's registration system, not legal or tax advice. Verify current rates with the Department of Stamps and Registration and take advice from an advocate on your own transaction.