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Latest Property Real Estate News - Published on 15/10/2010
The impact of the property cooling measures announced by MND on 30 August 2010, saw a huge impact on the sales volume of private residential properties in September 2010, with only 911 units being sold, a 27% drop from 1,248 in August. This also translates to the second lowest monthly sales for 2010 after June.
However, PropNex CEO Mr Mohamed Ismail reckons that this is a better than expected performance, given the property-cooling measures announced on 30 August 2010.
“347 units, or 38.1% of all units sold, came from NV Residences,” he observes. “Because of its location near Pasir Ris MRT station and an irresistibly attractive median price of $859psf, many HDB upgraders bought units there, buoying up what might have otherwise been a much quieter month in terms of sales.
And, in fact, signs are evident that the new measures are impacting even the deep-pocked investors. Properties with median prices of $2,000psf or more saw only 39 sales, the lowest for the year by far.
“This is a sign that there is a wait-and-see attitude even in the middle-to-higher income brackets where the investors are,” says Mr Ismail.
Based on the fact that at least 400 units, including 344 from new executive condominium Esparina Residences, have been sold in the first half of October, Mr Ismail expects about less than 500 to 700 units to be sold in October, with less than 600 per month for the last two months of 2010, pending further attractively-priced launches in the mass markets.
Mr Ismail also adds, referring to the fact that 47% of all the units sold in September saw a median price of below $1,000psf, that we can also expect to see the prices in the mass market dipping.
“There will be pressure for developers to price their projects downward,” he explains, “as new bids for residential land plots have been lower, less than $400psf in fact. Given the new measures and taking their cue from NV Residences, developers should be pricing their mass market projects at under $900psf for the next one year.
“And,” concludes Mr Ismail, “this would mean give consumers even more choices of low-end private housing, as well as affordable alternative to Executive Condominiums.”
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