Hiring a Vastu consultant

Vastu shastra is a body of traditional Indian texts on building, written for large houses on open plots. Many modern practitioners apply and extend it to flats and offices. Scholars describe it as a guideline rather than a rigid code, and critics, including the astrophysicist Jayant Narlikar, call modern Vastu claims unscientific. This guide sets out what the texts and practitioners recommend, and who says it.

Consultants describe much the same core service. They take compass readings, fix north on your plan, lay a Vastu grid over it, and check the entrance, kitchen, bedrooms, puja room, toilets and centre against the rules they follow. Most then give a written report with suggested changes.

• Before you buy a plot: some consultants offer a pre-purchase report on the plot's facing, shape, slope and surroundings (Vardhini Vastu and AlignAura both list one).
• A new house: a review of the architect's layout before it is fixed, and sometimes again before construction.
• A flat or a finished house: suggestions on room use, furniture, colours and 'remedies' rather than walls. Our guide to Vastu in a flat covers what practitioners suggest.

Kolkata-based consultant Nilangshu Haldar, quoted in the Millennium Post, describes three stages for Vastu: when buying land, during design, and with finishing touches such as colours. He says missing the first two doesn't rule out the third. Our room-by-room guide sets out what the texts and practitioners recommend for each room.

Many consultants now work from a floor plan, photos and a video call. For an online review, Vardhini Vastu asks for a floor plan (a builder's brochure plan will do for a flat), photos of each room and the entrance, your city, and who uses which room. You take compass readings on your phone during the call. VastuRaviraj says only a property map is needed for its online consultation.

1. Before you buy a plot, if Vastu would change your choice of plot.
2. Before the architect starts, so they can design to it. Architect Kanhai Gandhi of KNS Architects told The Established that he brings a Vastu consultant in at the start of projects to avoid redesigns.
3. When the concept layout is ready, for a review before the plan goes for sanction.
4. Before working drawings are issued, to check the kitchen, toilets and plumbing points are where everyone agreed.

The cost of leaving it late is mostly rework. MEP firm Secured Engineers describes a Ludhiana house where Vastu was raised at 60% construction and twelve changes cost ₹18–22 lakh and 8–10 weeks, against well under ₹2 lakh, it estimates, had Vastu been designed in from the start. That is one firm's account of one project, but the point holds: moving a toilet on paper is free, and on site it means moving plumbing.

There is no standard rate. Fees depend on the size of the property, the city, whether the consultant visits, and how well known they are. Most published figures come from consultants' own pages or from firms that sell to consultants, so treat these as ranges and get two or three quotes.

• Extras to ask about: travel, repeat visits (S. K. Datta charges 50% of the fee for a repeat visit), follow-up calls, GST and advance payment.
• City matters: Aurum PropTech puts Mumbai bungalow audits at ₹30,000–₹75,000 and says cities such as Pune, Jaipur and Indore run about 15–20% lower.
• Products are a separate cost. Aurum's sample budget for a mid-sized home adds ₹5,000–₹12,000 of 'retail items' on top of the fee. You don't have to buy them.

We found no Act, council or register that licenses Vastu consultants in India, and no source that says one exists. Aurum PropTech states plainly that there is no government licence or mandatory registration. Anyone can call themselves a Vastu consultant. That is different from architects, who must be registered with the Council of Architecture to use the title.

Formal courses do exist. IGNOU runs a P. G. Diploma in Vastushastra (PGDVS), and Shri Lal Bahadur Shastri National Sanskrit University in Delhi has a Department of Vastushastra offering a diploma, a two-year PG diploma, an MA and a PhD. Many private institutes also issue certificates and titles.

• Which texts or school of Vastu do you follow, and which rules are essential to you versus preferences? Sources disagree on bathrooms, kitchens and colours.
• What exactly does the fee cover: visits, a written report, a marked-up plan, follow-up calls, a second review when the architect revises the plan?
• Do you correct for magnetic declination in my city? (Aurum and Vardhini both raise this.)
• Can I see a sample report, with names removed?
• How many flats, plots or new houses like mine have you done?
• Do you mix astrology into the reading? If so, say so up front. Aurum lists undisclosed astrology, such as asking for birth details before looking at the plan, as a warning sign.
• Do you sell, or earn commission on, any products you recommend?
• What do you suggest when a rule clashes with the structure, the bye-laws or my society's rules?
• Are you happy to talk to my architect or designer directly?

These come from consultants' own warnings and from news reports. Vastu practitioners themselves often caution against fear: Harshit Kapadia says 'Vastu works with choice', not compulsion, and Vardhini Vastu's page says 'we do not sell greed and fear'.

• Fear: claims of illness, death or financial ruin by a set date unless you act now. Aurum PropTech lists this, and blaming past-life karma rather than the building.
• Guaranteed outcomes: wealth, health, a job or a marriage. In 2018 a Vijayapura man took a Vaastu agency to the consumer forum after it allegedly promised his daughters would marry within 3–8 months of remodelling. He had paid ₹11,600 in fees and spent ₹5 lakh on the work. The district forum said the matter wasn't within its purview, and the case went to the state forum.
• Demolition as the first answer: Aurum warns against consultants who insist on heavy demolition for every defect. Many consultants advertise remedies 'without demolition'. Any change to a structural wall needs a structural engineer and, in a flat, your society's written permission (see Vastu in a flat).
• Pressure to buy products: crystals, pyramids, yantras or copper strips sold straight after the visit, or bundled into the fee. Some consultants' own sites also run shops; VastuRaviraj's lists yantras, crystal bracelets and idols. Ask for the non-purchase option.
• Rituals and 'evil spirits': in 2024 Jabalpur police arrested a man accused of defrauding families of crores by claiming evil spirits or Vastu defects in their homes. One complainant said rituals cost him ₹14 lakh.
• No written report, a generic report that ignores your room sizes, or a price that changes after the consultant arrives.

Our room-by-room guide already says to share the consultant's notes before the layout is fixed. Here is how to make the handover work:

1. Ask for the report against your architect's own plan, with north marked and the consultant's suggestions drawn on it, not just a list.
2. Check that the consultant and the architect use the same north. Consultants work to magnetic readings corrected for your city; site plans usually show true north.
3. Have the consultant mark each point as essential or preferred. Parmar writes that most buyers accept 60–70% adherence, so agree the level before the architect redraws.
4. Send it to the architect, structural engineer and interior designer together. Ask them to flag anything that affects structure, sanction, plumbing or ventilation.
5. Hold one short meeting, or call, with the consultant and architect to settle conflicts. Then freeze the layout.
6. If the plan changes later, send the revision back to the consultant before working drawings go out.

For a flat, consultants such as Nitien Parmar note that common walls and the builder's layout limit what any consultant can change. Kapadia points out that identical flats stacked in a tower can't all have 'bad' Vastu. See Vastu in a flat for what practitioners suggest without building work.