DLF Ltd., India’s biggest developer, posted a third-quarter profit of 21.45 billion rupees ($544 million) on growing demand for houses, offices and hotels in Asia’s third-largest economy. Sales at the company and its units totaled 36 billion rupees in the three months ended Dec. 31, compared with 33.5 billion rupees in the second quarter, New Delhi-based DLF said today in a statement to the National Stock Exchange. The company, which raised $2.2 billion in June in what was then India’s biggest initial share sale, didn’t give year-earlier figures.

The offering made DLF Chairman Kushal Pal Singh the world’s richest developer with a fortune of $35 billion, according to Forbes. Indian developers are borrowing to meet increasing demand for homes and other properties after the economy grew at an average of 8.6 percent in the past four years.

“Genuine demand for houses still remains high,” said A. Balasubramaniam, who manages $8.6 billion at Birla Sun Life Asset Management in Mumbai and owns shares in DLF. “Developers with good land inventory, ability to execute large projects and diversification across regions and segments have an advantage.”

DLF advanced 0.7 percent to 889 rupees as of 12:24 p.m. on the Mumbai stock exchange, after rising as much as 2.3 percent.

The company was expected to report a third-quarter profit of 20.6 billion rupees, according to the median estimate of four analysts surveyed by Bloomberg. Profit in the second quarter ended Sept. 30 was 20.2 billion rupees.

Housing Shortage

India may face a shortage of 26.5 million houses by 2012 as rising wages boost demand, the government said in December. Per capita income doubled to 22,483 rupees in the year to March 2007, compared with 2000.

Robust economic growth is keeping demand buoyant, Chief Financial Officer Ramesh Sanka said in an interview in New Delhi. DLF plans to build 6,000 apartments this quarter, compared with 3,000 apartments in the three months to Dec. 31 and is limiting sales to one per family to focus sales to user-buyers, he said.

The five-decade-old company has 738 million square feet of real estate available for development, according to DLF’s Web site.

The developer in October won a contract for $15 billion township near Bangalore with Dubai World. The township at Bidadi, 35 kilometers (22 miles) southwest of Bangalore, is expected to house 750,000 people on a plot covering 4,000 hectares (9,884 acres).

DLF has a joint venture with Hilton Hotels Corp. to develop more than 75 hotels in India. In August, it formed a venture with Hines, a closely held U.S. property investor, to develop an office, retail, hotel and entertainment project on a 15-acre site in Gurgaon, on the outskirts of New Delhi.

During the third quarter, DLF entered into an agreement with Adrian Zecha, the promoter of Amanresorts, to tap the growing number of affluent tourists across Asia. Amanresorts owns and operates 22 luxury resorts across the world, including Phuket in Thailand, Bali in Indonesia and sites in the U.S. and India.