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Home prices may drop 20% by 2016: report

Posted on 15 Sep 2014 | Comments Off

Home prices in Singapore could fall by 20 percent between 2014 and 2016 as economic restructuring, tighter population policies and property measures continue to weigh on the real estate market, according to a Bank of America Merrill Lynch (BOAML) report in the media.

“We believe the fate of the market will depend very much on the direction of policy, particularly on restructuring, immigration and foreign workers, as well as the timing of the relaxation of strict property measures,” wrote economist Chua Hak Bin in the report.

He noted overly tight population policies will limit the number of a younger foreign workforce, and affect property prices. Maintaining the cooling measures would also “imply a greater negative impact from rising mortgage rates and persistence of housing distortions”.

On the restructuring front, Chua believes Singapore’s move to a productivity-driven growth model, which is a long-term process, has produced mixed results. Notably, it has reduced the growth of Gross Domestic Product (GDP), while employment growth and total job creation is expected to moderate this year.

“We do not see the government reversing course, but a pause may be in order…as companies, particularly SMEs, are having trouble adjusting to the speed of the tightening,” said Chua.

Any potential relaxation of property cooling measures is likely to happen only in H2 2015, as cyclical property measures such as stamp duties and loan-to-value limits may be relaxed when US interest rates and Singapore mortgage rates start rising.

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Posted in Property Market / Real Estate

Tagged Cooling measures, residential Home prices, Singapore Property Market, tight population policies

GCB prices still soaring amid fewer sales

Posted on 9 Sep 2014 | Comments Off

Prices of good class bungalows (GCBs), considered the most expensive homes in Singapore, grew 6.7 percent to average $1,488 psf in H1 2014 from $1,395 psf in 2013, a CBRE report said.

The uptick was due to the sale of four smaller bungalows with land areas below 15,000 sq ft, for between $1,494 psf and $1,811 psf.

Based on caveats analysis by CBRE, 15 GCBs changed hands in the first six months of this year, compared to 29 for the whole of 2013.

Of the 15 deals, five went for above $30 million each.

The priciest bungalow sold in the first half went for $31.80 million. Located along Cable Road in the Tanglin area, that translates to $1,904 psf on the land area of 16,706 sq ft.

According to the report, sales activity in the GCB market has been rather selective this year. “The mismatch in price expectations between buyers and sellers means a longer time is needed for deals to be struck.”

But CBRE believes there will still be interest in this market for the remainder of the year, attributed to limited commodity. There are only 2,800 such bungalows in Singapore.

Furthermore, as GCB owners have strong holding power, there won’t be fire sales.

“Under the current soft market conditions as well as with the property measures in place, buyers tend to be mainly end-users rather than investors. Taking into account the constraints posed by the TDSR framework, interest might shift to bungalows of lower value ($10 million to $15 million) if there are owners looking to sell,” stated the report.

These would likely be smaller bungalows, or those located outside districts 10, 11 and 21, like in the Chestnut Avenue and Windsor Park GCB areas.