Before a project launches, buyers are often offered a way to get ahead of the queue: fill in an expression of interest form, hand over a cheque, and get priority when the price list is released. The cheque might be called a token, a blocking amount or a pre-launch booking. This guide explains what those payments are under Maharashtra law, whether you can get them back, and what to have in writing before any money changes hands.
First, the plain position on Codename Vybe. A MahaRERA registration number has not been published for it yet, and no money should be paid for a home in it until one is, whatever the payment is called. Registering interest on this website means leaving your contact details so the plans and the price list reach you. It is not a booking, and it costs nothing.
What EOIs, tokens and pre-launch bookings are
None of these terms appears in the Real Estate (Regulation and Development) Act, 2016. They are market labels, and they usually mean one of three things:
- Expression of interest, or EOI. A form, often with a cheque, stating that you want a home in a project when it launches. In return you are usually promised priority in choosing a unit, an early price, or both.
- Token or blocking amount. A smaller sum to hold a particular flat, or a place in the queue, while the paperwork follows.
- Pre-launch or soft-launch booking. A sale made before the project is registered, often at a discount offered to early buyers.
What a payment really is depends on what it does, not on the word printed at the top of the form. If it reserves a flat or a price for you, it works as a booking.
What RERA says about money before registration
Section 3 of the Act says that no promoter shall advertise, market, book, sell or offer for sale, or invite people to buy, any apartment in a real estate project without first registering the project with the state’s regulatory authority. The exemptions are narrow: land of not more than 500 square metres, or not more than eight apartments across all phases. The plans issued so far for Codename Vybe show 53 homes in A Building alone, so the project has to be registered before any of them can be booked.
The penalties are in Section 59. A promoter who breaks Section 3 can be fined up to ten per cent of the estimated cost of the project. One who keeps breaking it, or ignores the authority’s orders, faces up to three years’ imprisonment, a further fine of up to ten per cent, or both.
Regulators do use these powers. The Free Press Journal reported on 1 February 2024 that MahaRERA had issued show cause notices to 41 promoters, most of them in the Pune region, for advertising projects without a registration number, and had appealed to people not to transact in projects that do not have one. In Telangana, Siasat reported on 14 March 2026 that the state’s RERA had fined Bharathi Builders about ₹4.74 crore for collecting money through pre-launch offers on an unregistered project at Kompally in Hyderabad, and had ordered it to refund buyers with interest within 60 days. That order does not bind anyone in Maharashtra, but it shows how a regulator reads such schemes.
We could not find a MahaRERA order that deals with EOIs by name. Section 3, which covers booking and inviting people to buy, is the rule that applies.
The ten per cent line once a project is registered
Registration is where a buyer’s protections begin. Under Section 13, a promoter cannot accept more than ten per cent of the cost of the apartment as an advance payment or application fee without first entering into a written agreement for sale and registering it.
In Maharashtra the step in between is the allotment letter, which has to follow a model format approved by MahaRERA in 2022. Its cancellation clause caps what a developer can keep if you change your mind. As a Free Press Journal column of January 2024 summarised MahaRERA’s Order No. 35 of 12 August 2022:
- Cancel within 15 days of the allotment letter and the full amount comes back.
- From 16 to 30 days, the developer can deduct up to 1 per cent of the flat’s price.
- From 31 to 60 days, up to 1.5 per cent.
- After 60 days, no more than 2 per cent.
The balance is due within 45 days of cancellation. What the allotment letter and the agreement for sale each commit the developer to is set out in the guide to both documents.
Is an EOI refundable?
Before registration, only if the paper says so. The ten per cent cap, the model allotment letter with its cancellation table, and the rule that 70 per cent of buyers’ money goes into a separate account for the project all attach to a registered project. Money paid before that has none of them around it. A “fully refundable” EOI is a promise from a company, and it is worth what the document and the company behind it are worth.
The other risks are practical. The price list may not match what was suggested when you paid. The flat you hoped for may be priced or placed differently. Approvals can take longer than expected, and plans can change before they are sanctioned: Codename Vybe’s own drawings are marked tentative until final column positions are fixed. A refund that arrives months later, without interest, is a cost of its own.
What to get in writing
Once a project is registered and you decide to book, have each of these in hand before you pay:
- The MahaRERA registration number, checked by you on maharera.maharashtra.gov.in, with confirmation that it covers the building you are buying in. The guide to checking MahaRERA walks through it.
- A receipt in the name of the promoter company registered on MahaRERA, showing the project, the amount, the date and how you paid. Pay by cheque or bank transfer to the company’s account, never in cash and never to an individual.
- A written statement of what the payment is: a booking amount, adjusted against the price of a named flat.
- An allotment letter in MahaRERA’s model format, with the flat number, its carpet area and the total price.
- Cancellation and refund terms that are no worse for you than the model table above.
- A date by which the agreement for sale will be signed and registered, before your payments cross ten per cent.
- If a broker is involved, their MahaRERA agent registration number.
Where Codename Vybe stands
No MahaRERA registration number has been published for Codename Vybe, no price list has been released and no bookings are open. When the number is issued, it will be shown on this website. Until then, please do not pay any amount to anyone for a home in the project, whether it is described as an EOI, a token, a refundable cheque or a priority fee. If anyone asks you for money now, we would like to know.
In the meantime, the six layouts are on the floor plans page, and the developers’ existing registered projects are listed on the developer page. This is general information about the Act, not legal advice.
To hear when the registration and the price list are published, leave your details on the contact page.
