Buying a home in Bengaluru involves more than picking a locality and signing a cheque. Between guidance values, stamp duty slabs, Khata status, and RERA checks, the process has several legal steps that protect your investment if you follow them in order. Here is a short, practical walkthrough of how it works in 2026.
Step 1: Set Your Budget and Shortlist Localities
Start with your total budget, including the property price plus statutory charges (more on this below). Bengaluru's micro-markets vary widely in price and appreciation potential, from established corridors like Whitefield and Sarjapur Road to emerging ones like Devanahalli near the airport. Match your shortlist to your commute, budget, and whether you want a ready-to-move home or an under-construction project.
Step 2: Verify RERA Registration
For any project with more than eight units or built on land over 500 square mtr, RERA registration is mandatory in Karnataka. Before paying a booking amount, check the project on rera.karnataka.gov.in using the project name or registration number. Confirm the status shows Ongoing or Completed, not Lapsed, and check whether the promoter has any pending complaints. For resale properties, RERA does not apply, so title verification through an Encumbrance Certificate becomes the key check instead.
Step 3: Check Khata Status
Khata is the property tax record maintained by BBMP (or BDA, BMRDA, and panchayats outside city limits) and it determines whether you can get a home loan and register the property. Khata A means the property is fully compliant. Khata B signals partial compliance and restricts both loans and resale, so it is best avoided regardless of any price discount offered. Since 2024, e-Khata has been mandatory for new registrations, transfers, and building plan approvals in Bengaluru, so ask for the digital e-Khata rather than a paper copy.
Step 4: Confirm the Guidance Value
The guidance value is the government-notified minimum value for a property in a given area, and stamp duty is calculated on whichever is higher, the guidance value or your actual purchase price. Guidance values were revised upward across Bengaluru in February 2026, so check the current figure on the Kaveri Online Services portal before finalising your budget.
Step 5: Understand Stamp Duty and Registration Charges
Karnataka uses a slab-based stamp duty structure:
Below ₹20 lakh: 2%
₹20 lakh to ₹45 lakh: 3%
Above ₹45 lakh: 5% Registration charges were raised from 1% to 2% of the property value in August 2025, the first revision since 2003. Add applicable cess and surcharge, and the total statutory cost now works out to roughly 7% to 7.6% of the property value in most cases. These charges are the same regardless of the buyer's gender, and they apply on top of the property price, so factor them into your budget from the start.
Step 6: Arrange Financing
If you need a home loan, get your eligibility assessed early and keep your KYC, income, and property documents ready. Lenders will only finance Khata A properties with clean titles, so the due diligence from Steps 2 and 3 also protects your loan approval.
Step 7: Complete Registration on Kaveri 2.0
Once you're ready to close, pay the stamp duty online through the Kaveri 2.0 portal, book an appointment at the Sub-Registrar's office, and attend with the seller and witnesses to execute the sale deed. Since January 2026, Karnataka has also enabled fully digital e-stamping under the Karnataka Stamp (Digital e-Stamp) Rules, 2025, so you can generate your stamp duty certificate online without visiting a bank. After registration, the mutation process updates the Revenue Department's land records separately from your Khata.
Step 8: Update Records Post-Purchase
After registration, apply for the Khata transfer in your name and update the property tax records with BBMP. This step is often missed but is essential for future resale or loan applications.
