A joint venture landowner share is calculated on constructed area, at a ratio fixed in the development agreement, adjusted for signing money and for any variation in the units each side actually receives. In Dhaka, 40 to 50 percent of the constructed area to the landowner is the common band for a residential JV. But the ratio is only the headline — every dispute that reaches a lawyer comes from the four adjustments underneath it, not from the ratio itself.
The four terms that decide the money
1. The base of the ratio. "Fifty percent" of what? Total constructed area, net saleable area, or the flat area excluding common space? On a 60,000 sq ft building, the difference between total constructed and net saleable can be 8,000 to 12,000 sq ft — enough to change the profitability of the whole project. The agreement must name one basis and one measurement method.
2. Signing money. Paid at agreement, usually adjustable against the landowner's share at settlement. If it is adjustable, the mechanism matters: is it deducted as money against the value of the landowner's units, or converted to area at the agreed rate? Both are used; only one can be in the agreement.
3. The unit allocation. Ratios are in area, but people take delivery of flats, and flats are not fungible. A south-facing third floor is not the same asset as a north-facing ninth floor. Good agreements set the selection method in advance: alternate picking, floor-wise splitting, or a pre-agreed schedule attached to the agreement.
4. The trailing items. Parking, roof rights, servant quarters, utility connection costs, and the cost of the landowner's own registration. Each is small; together they are the majority of post-completion arguments.
A worked settlement
Take a plot in Bashundhara producing 48,000 sq ft of constructed area, 40,000 sq ft net saleable, agreed at 45 percent to the landowner on net saleable area, with BDT 1,50,00,000 signing money adjustable at BDT 9,000 per sq ft.
| Line | Basis | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Net saleable area | Measured | 40,000 sq ft |
| Landowner share | 45% | 18,000 sq ft |
| Signing money adjustment | 1,50,00,000 ÷ 9,000 | 1,667 sq ft |
| Net landowner entitlement | 18,000 − 1,667 | 16,333 sq ft |
| Units allocated | From schedule | 12 flats, 16,240 sq ft |
| Balance owed to landowner | 93 sq ft × 9,000 | BDT 8,37,000 |
The last row is the one systems usually cannot produce, because it requires the allocation and the entitlement to live in the same place. Doing it in a spreadsheet at handover time, three years after the agreement, is how the number gets argued about.
What has to be tracked from day one
- The agreement terms as data — ratio, basis, rate, deadlines, penalty — not as a scanned PDF nobody opens.
- Every payment to the landowner, with the head it was paid against.
- The unit schedule, marked landowner or developer, updated when a swap is agreed.
- The completion deadline and any extension, because delay penalties usually run against the developer.
The clauses that create each of these are covered in the JV agreement clauses that decide the next four years.
The mistake that costs the most
Selling a unit that belongs to the landowner. It happens when the sales team works from an inventory list that does not distinguish owner units, and it is expensive to unwind — you either buy the unit back from your own landowner at market price or hand a different one over. The fix is to hold landowner units in the same inventory as everything else, flagged and blocked from sale, so the sales floor cannot see them as available. That is the same control described in double booking prevention.
What to do next
Take your oldest live JV and try to produce, in one page, the landowner's entitlement in square feet, the units allocated so far, and the balance in money. If that takes more than ten minutes, put the agreement terms and the unit schedule in one system before the project reaches handover.