Amit Goenka and the institutional bridge: how Nisus Finance is rewiring Indian capital flows into Gulf real estate

The India-GCC real estate corridor has matured well beyond the diaspora remittance model. Family offices, sovereign wealth funds, and branded developers have captured headlines for years. Yet the most consequential shift may be occurring in a less visible layer of the capital stack: the institutional fund management infrastructure that channels Indian insurance treasuries, NBFC balance sheets, and pension-adjacent capital pools into structured Gulf real estate vehicles. Amit Goenka, founder and CEO of Nisus Finance (NiFCO), is building precisely this intermediary architecture, and his strategy illuminates a broader transformation in how institutional India engages with Gulf property markets.

Nisus Finance currently manages assets under management of INR 14 billion and is constructing a Dubai-based platform with a target AUM of US$1 billion, according to Realty Plus. The firm's focus on structured debt for mid-market and affordable housing segments sets it apart from the sovereign wealth and ultra-luxury operators that dominate GCC real estate narratives. Goenka's model relies on structured finance origination, on-the-ground asset oversight, and relationship infrastructure spanning both Indian and GCC jurisdictions. This is capital orchestration in its most granular form, connecting regulated Indian institutional pools with Gulf-based investment vehicles through compliant, repeatable structures.

The scale of the opportunity justifies the ambition. The UAE real estate market comprises almost US$680 billion worth of assets and US$207 billion of annual sales, according to Gulf Business. Dubai rental growth surged by over 28% year-on-year, while capital values increased by over 20% in the same period. These figures describe a market with deep liquidity, strong yield compression dynamics, and, crucially, an enormous appetite for external funding. According to projections cited by Nisus Finance and reported by Gulf Business, the UAE real estate market requires in excess of US$100 billion in funding each year to continue its current pace of growth.

This funding gap is where the institutional intermediary becomes indispensable.

Why does the fund management intermediary layer matter more than developer capital?

GRI Institute's coverage of the India-GCC corridor has extensively profiled developers, family offices, and conglomerate-level investors. The Hinduja Group's Gulf expansion, Indian-origin operators establishing permanent GCC platforms, and sovereign-backed development partnerships have all received sustained attention. What remains underexplored, however, is the capital allocation function that sits between institutional Indian limited partners and Gulf real estate general partners.

This intermediary layer performs several critical functions that neither developers nor family offices replicate. First, it aggregates regulated institutional capital, including insurance company investment pools, NBFC treasury allocations, and quasi-pension vehicles, into deployment-ready structures that comply with both Indian outbound investment regulations and GCC fund domiciliation requirements. Second, it provides ongoing asset-level oversight that institutional LPs demand but rarely build for themselves in foreign jurisdictions. Third, it creates repeatable transaction templates that lower the marginal cost of each subsequent deployment.

Amit Goenka's strategy at Nisus Finance represents this function in its most developed form. Rather than competing with Emaar, Aldar, or Omniyat on development, or with sovereign wealth funds on trophy asset acquisitions, Goenka has positioned NiFCO as the structured finance originator that enables Indian institutional capital to access Gulf real estate yield without assuming direct development risk. The structured debt focus is deliberate: it offers institutional LPs the credit discipline and current income characteristics they require, while providing Gulf developers and asset holders with an alternative funding source at a moment when the market's capital absorption needs far exceed traditional bank lending capacity.

This positioning creates a fundamentally different value proposition from other prominent actors in the India-GCC investment ecosystem.

How does Nisus Finance's approach contrast with sovereign wealth and family office strategies in the GCC?

The GCC real estate investment landscape operates across distinct capital layers, each with its own return expectations, governance structures, and deployment timeframes. Understanding where Nisus Finance fits requires mapping these layers with precision.

At the sovereign wealth level, Navid Chamdia, Head of Real Estate at the Qatar Investment Authority (QIA), oversees global direct acquisitions and co-investments on behalf of one of the world's largest sovereign funds. QIA's real estate mandate encompasses trophy assets, platform investments, and strategic co-investments across global gateway cities. The deployment scale, governance complexity, and geopolitical considerations at this level bear little resemblance to the structured mid-market debt vehicles that Nisus Finance originates.

At the family office and private capital level, Amine Bouchentouf serves as Chief Investment Officer of Atlas Mena Capital LLC, an Abu Dhabi-based family office. Family offices in the GCC increasingly pursue experiential real estate strategies, blending hospitality, branded residences, and lifestyle-oriented assets into portfolios that reflect both financial return targets and family legacy considerations. Meanwhile, 021 Investments operates as a regulated private equity firm focused on developing and operating hospitality assets across Europe and the United States, representing the broader trend of GCC-linked private equity capital flowing into experiential and operational real estate beyond the Gulf itself.

Nisus Finance occupies neither of these positions. Goenka's firm functions as a capital formation and deployment intermediary, aggregating institutional pools that are individually too small or too constrained by regulatory mandates to access Gulf real estate directly, then structuring compliant vehicles that deliver the yield, duration, and credit characteristics these pools require. The structured debt emphasis means NiFCO's capital sits senior to equity in the project capital stack, offering downside protection that institutional mandates typically demand.

This is a meaningful distinction. Indian institutional investors, particularly insurance companies and NBFCs, operate under strict regulatory frameworks governing foreign investment allocations, asset-liability matching, and credit quality thresholds. A fund manager that understands both the Indian regulatory architecture and the GCC real estate operating environment can unlock capital flows that would otherwise remain dormant. Nisus Finance's dual-jurisdiction infrastructure, with origination capability in India and asset oversight in the Gulf, is designed to serve precisely this bridging function.

What does the legacy asset unlock mean for institutional allocators?

One of the most compelling structural opportunities in GCC real estate lies in the anticipated release of legacy assets held by traditional families. According to projections reported by Nisus Finance and Gulf Business, traditional families are expected to unlock legacy assets, with an estimated US$8 billion of freehold rented assets and US$6 billion of GCC assets available for sale in the near term.

For institutional allocators, this pipeline represents a rare opportunity to acquire income-producing assets with established tenancy profiles, stable cash flows, and valuations that reflect family-driven holding strategies rather than fully marketed institutional pricing. Structured debt providers, in particular, can participate in this transition by financing acquisitions, repositioning capital expenditure, or providing bridge facilities that enable smooth ownership transitions.

The legacy asset unlock also signals a broader maturation of GCC real estate capital markets. As traditional family holdings enter institutional ownership structures, the asset class becomes more transparent, more liquid, and more accessible to cross-border capital. Fund managers with on-the-ground relationships, legal structuring expertise, and institutional-grade reporting capabilities stand to capture significant market share during this transition.

Goenka's positioning of Nisus Finance's Dubai platform with a US$1 billion AUM target appears calibrated to this moment. The structured debt model is particularly well suited to legacy asset transitions, where sellers require certainty of execution and buyers require flexible, bespoke financing rather than standardized bank products.

The strategic architecture of cross-border capital formation

The India-GCC real estate corridor is evolving from a bilateral trade relationship into a multilateral capital ecosystem. Indian-origin operators are shifting from capital intermediaries to embedded principals in GCC real estate, building permanent platforms with local licensing, local teams, and local deal flow. Amit Goenka's strategy at Nisus Finance exemplifies this evolution: rather than brokering one-off transactions, the firm is constructing durable institutional infrastructure designed to facilitate repeated, scalable capital deployments.

GRI Institute's ongoing engagement with senior decision-makers across the India-GCC corridor, through its GCC real estate events and cross-border investment discussions, provides a forum where precisely these structural shifts are debated and refined. The fund management intermediary layer, represented by practitioners like Goenka, deserves sustained analytical attention because it determines the velocity and volume of institutional capital flowing into Gulf real estate.

The question is no longer whether Indian institutional capital will reach GCC real estate markets. The question is which intermediary architectures will prove most durable, most compliant, and most capable of scaling. The firms that build genuine dual-jurisdiction infrastructure, combine structured finance origination with asset-level oversight, and maintain institutional-grade governance will define the next phase of this corridor's development.

Nisus Finance's trajectory from a INR 14 billion Indian AUM base to a US$1 billion Gulf platform is one of the most instructive case studies in this emerging landscape. The outcome will reveal much about the capacity of Indian institutional capital to participate meaningfully in the GCC's next growth cycle.