The four major agencies, Centaline, Midland, Ricacorp and Hongkong Land, all recorded significant growth in the top 10 residential property transactions this past Saturday. Among them, Centaline Property recorded 10 transactions in the top 10 estates, back to double-digit level, an increase of 4 cases or 66.7% week-on-week, while zero transactions narrowed to 3 estates.
Centaline Property Asia Pacific Vice Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the Residential Division, Vincent Chan, said that the banking crisis in Europe and the United States has faded, the stock market has recently rebounded, and Hong Kong has not followed the United States to raise interest rates, the market atmosphere has improved, nearly 300 transactions were recorded in the primary market on Saturday, reflecting the recovery of buyers' confidence, secondary transactions are also driven, I believe this month's property market will be more robust than last month.
Another major bank, Midland's top 10 estates recorded 11 transactions. Mr. Bo Siu Ming, Chief Executive Officer (Hong Kong and Macau) of Midland Realty, also believes that the first-hand sales have led to a hot property market, but the second-hand market is constrained by the new properties, and many owners have seen the market atmosphere has improved, the bargaining attitude has also become stronger, buyers also tend to be cautious to enter the market, short-term second-hand trading performance is mixed.
He expects that the Hong Kong economy continues to rebound, and the Federal Reserve is expected to peak in the year, Hong Kong interest rates upward space is limited, coupled with a new group of Hong Kong people purchasing power to drive the long-term support for the property market, but short-term secondary property prices will be consolidated, or slow down the rate of increase.
As for Hong Kong Land's Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Ma Taiyang pointed out that the developers have offered prices at discounted prices to attract a large number of buyers to buy flats, it is believed that the developers will still adopt the strategy of opening flats at discounted prices in the short term, and it is expected that the first-hand transactions will still be good in April, but the second-hand transactions will continue to be under pressure in the short term.
According to Mr. Liu Weiqiang, President of Ricacorp Properties, the two new properties in Kowloon are selling well this Saturday, driving the overall atmosphere of the market to improve, some new properties to the corner customers to second-hand target housing estates to find a treasure, so that the second-hand transactions rebounded.
On the other hand, some second-hand owners, seeing that new properties have captured the purchasing power of the market, have recently been willing to expand their bargaining power, which has gradually eased the tug of war between second-hand sales and purchases, attracting prospective buyers who were on the sidelines earlier to return to the market, and it is believed that the volume of second-hand transactions will be stable to upward this month.
Despite the improvement in the property market, the secondary market continues to record transactions at an erosion rate, reflecting that the market has not yet fully recovered. Centaline's Senior Divisional Sales Director, Mr Ng Kam-kee, said the market recorded a new transaction for a 436 sq ft, two-room apartment B in the middle of Block 9 of Tseung Kwan O Centre, which was put up for sale less than a month ago, at a price reduction of $850,000 or 10.6%, and changed hands for $7.15 million at $16,399 per square foot.
The original owner has been the owner for 3 years and has a book loss of $150,000 or 2%. Centaline Tsui Ka-lun said that Flat B5, a high-rise in Block 3, Phase 1, Yun Hui, Pak Shek Kok, Tai Po, with a saleable area of 451 sq ft and two bedrooms, was offered at $8.3 million and sold for $8.18 million at $18,137 per square foot. Although the price of the square footage set a new high of 8 months for two rooms in the estate, but the original owner of the property for 4 years, the account still lost about 450,000 yuan.
