Outside the ‘center’, Pirituba becomes the darling of construction companies in São Paulo

With almost 7,300 units, the Grand Reserva Paulista project, launched in 2017 by MRV, it is the group’s biggest project in the country, but for a short time. According to Sandro Perin, executive manager of the developer in the São Paulo region, an even larger new venture will be launched soon by the company. In common, the Grand Reserva and the new project have the district: Pirituba, in the north of São Paulo.

MRV is not the only company that has decided to invest in the region. According to a survey carried out by the market intelligence platform Urbit, Pirituba was the peripheral district that registered the highest number of residential units launched in the last three years, with 5,011.

Peripheral, in this case, refers to the geographic classification of regions outside the expanded center of São Paulo, the same used, for example, by CET to establish vehicle rotation.

It is followed by Cidade Ademar (4,118), in the south zone, and José Bonifácio (3,352), in the east.

Despite not being part of the expanded center, limited by the Marginal Tietê, Pirituba is located on its edge, which makes it very attractive to the real estate market.

“You move quickly to the center and everything is close by, shopping, college, supermarket chains,” says Perin, who also mentions the subway’s Line 6-Orange, scheduled for 2025.

Real estate developers, especially in the economic segment, look with increasing interest to neighborhoods far from the city center. This is where they can find availability of land, and at lower prices, which helps to enable the construction of economic units, which meet the ranges of the Casa Verde and Amarela program, explains Daniela Ferrari, executive director of affordable housing at Secovi-SP (Housing Union).

In São Paulo, the program limits the value of properties to R$264,000, and purchasing families must have a monthly income of up to R$7,000.

However, having space and being cheap is not enough, it is necessary to have infrastructure and services that accommodate the densification of the population. “The important thing is that the launches happen along with these improvements, the economic consumer needs the availability of transport and services”, says Ferrari.

Another district that appears among the first positions in number of launches is Penha, in the east side. The developer Cury, also specialized in the economic segment, has projects in the region. Leonardo Mesquita, the company’s commercial vice president, says that the presence of the subway in the area, with the red line, is an attraction of the neighborhood, but emphasizes that the classification of the district as peripheral is a matter of scale.

“When we analyze Greater São Paulo, these neighborhoods end up becoming central and become very attractive, because they have good infrastructure and are able to bring people from further away from this expanded center to live much closer”, says Mesquita.

This year, the company also launches the fourth phase of Lyne Pirituba, in the northern district of São Paulo, with two-bedroom apartments starting at R$ 6,000/m².

Architect and urban planner Lucas Chiconi, himself a resident of Tatuapé, another neighborhood considered peripheral by the survey’s classification, has a similar opinion to Mesquita’s.

According to him, the term peripheral refers to a social situation rather than a purely geographical one, and could hardly be applied to neighborhoods like Tatuapé, Santana and Penha, which have an established and old middle class. “When it comes to the city, populations in occupations in the Center are peripheral, while those who live in Alphaville are rich people”, he says.

As for districts such as Cidade Ademar, José Bonifácio, Campo Limpo and São Mateus, the classification would make sense.

According to data from Secovi-SP for last year, São Mateus was the fourth district to have more launches of economic units (behind Sacomã, Pirituba and Cambuci). It also appears in eighth place in the Urbit survey.

For Ferrari, just go to the region to understand what attracts so many residents and businesses there. “It’s a very extreme neighborhood, but it has a bus terminal that is a hub for the region, and now has Line 15-Silver stations. [monotrilho]which reinforce this growth”.

MRV has projects there, and Perin says they are designed for an audience that earns between 3 and 6 minimum wages (R$3,636 to R$7,272)

The company also invests in Guaianases, on the east side, with buildings designed for families earning up to 3 salaries. The district is one of the ten that have, proportionally, the largest area for new projects, according to Urbit data, with 14.38% of its territory still subject to transformation.

To arrive at this account, the platform mixed data on zoning, number of floors and the function of the properties – land larger than 600 square meters, empty or with buildings of up to three floors, and which are not occupied by hospitals, schools, churches and clubs, nor do they belong to the Union.

The champion of this ranking is the district of Vila Guilherme, in the north, with 34.52% of its territory subject to transformation.

MRV’s Perin says demand is not lacking. “The demand in São Paulo is greater than the supply, and it is very difficult to [habitação popular] in the central regions.”