An auction of luxury apartments in Mucha did not do as well as organizers had hoped yesterday, with only four out of 13 Taipei Garden Town Housing units sold for a total of NT$68.8 million.
If all 13 units had been sold the auction would have raised at least NT$251.5 million, based on the units' minimum bids.
"We had a closing rate of 30.8 percent, which was lower than our expectations of a rate of over 50 percent," said Allen Hsu (
Advisor, the auction's organizer.
All four deals, however, closed at their asking prices of NT$15.3 million, NT$15.3 million, NT$18.7 million and NT$19.5 million.
"The remaining [18] participating bidders failed to put down any bids, appearing to adopt a wait-and-see approach," Hsu said at a press conference yesterday.
The disappointing outcome of yesterday's auction can be blamed on the public's unfamiliarity with the idea of auctioning off newly built luxury homes, he said.
According to Hsu, over 450 people visited the site in the past month as part of the auction preview. Only 22 people actually put down the NT$600,000 deposit required to take part in the auction.
"We were a little disappointed with the poor participation," Hsu said.
He said that the company hasn't yet decided what to do with nine unsold units, pending further discussions with the property's owner.
"But there won't be price cuts since that would be unfair to the bid winners," Hsu said.
He said his company may hold more auctions to sell off the remaining properties.
Chen Yun-ru (陳韻如), a manager at the Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房屋), said she wasn't surprised with the poor outcome.
"The higher the asking price at such a luxury-housing auction, the lower the closing rate will be since the public is used to buying low-priced houses at auctions," she said.
Chen said that the asking prices were pretty reasonable, but many people are used to bargaining and may wish to make a private deal with the owner later.
She said DTZ now faces a pricing dilemma, since future price cuts would taint yesterday's auction, but standing firm on the minimum bids might not attract other buyers.
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last
US CONSCULTANT: The US Department of Commerce’s Ursula Burns is a rarely seen US government consultant to be put forward to sit on the board, nominated as an independent director Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday nominated 10 candidates for its new board of directors, including Ursula Burns from the US Department of Commerce. It is rare that TSMC has nominated a US government consultant to sit on its board. Burns was nominated as one of seven independent directors. She is vice chair of the department’s Advisory Council on Supply Chain Competitiveness. Burns is to stand for election at TSMC’s annual shareholders’ meeting on June 4 along with the rest of the candidates. TSMC chairman Mark Liu (劉德音) was not on the list after in December last