Sinyi Real Estate Inc (信義房屋), Taiwan's largest real-estate broker, has vowed to expand its business this year by opening another 21 branch offices locally and nearly 50 franchise offices in China, company executives said yesterday.
"Our goal is to increase the number of local offices from 128 to 150 by the end of this year and the number of China-based offices from 54 to 100," Sinyi general manager Jeremy Shive (
Expressing a bullish view toward this year's real-estate market, Shive said the company's revenues are expected to grow by 40 percent this year.
The nation's property market is expected to continue booming this year due to low house prices, low bank-interest rates and a 50-percent cut in land-value increment tax, in addition to the impact of the government's preferential loans, worth NT$280 million (US$8.24 billion), which are gradually being released by banks.
Without offering projected figures, Shive said that 90 percent of the company's revenues were generated from real-estate transactions while the remaining 10 percent came from acting as agents for newly built housing projects.
The company said it had sold housing projects valued at NT$12.5 billion last year, and aims to manage more projects this year to a value of NT$20 billion.
"We sold every unit for most housing projects we managed last year," Shive said, adding he was confident that Sinyi would perform as rosily as it did last year.
With the nation's real-estate market in recovery since the second half of last year, property prices in northern Taiwan are expected to grow by five to 10 percent this year, he said.
Prices in the center and the south of the country, however, could hover at around current levels, he said.
Sinyi also said the market in such Chinese cities as Shanghai, Suzhou and Hangzhou was of great importance to the company, generating approximately 2 billion yuan (NT$8.17 billion) in annual sales.
"Our flagship branch in Beijing is slated to open in March," said Howard Chou (周莊雲), an associate manager at Sinyi.
Sinyi entered the Shanghai market in 1993, making it the first property agent from Taiwan to set up a branch in China. Currently, the company focuses on office leasing in Shanghai.
Sinyi's franchised offices in China mostly cater to China-based Taiwanese and other foreigners. An increasing number of investors and developers from Taiwan is investing in real estate in China, particularly Shanghai.
But the company has also seen a rise in Chinese customers seeking their services, Chou said.
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