The number of private homes completed in Hong Kong rose to a four-year high this year, underscoring government efforts to boost the housing supply and curb rising prices.
In the first nine months, 11,100 private homes were completed, the Hong Kong Transport and Housing Bureau said in a quarterly report on its Web site. That compares with the 7,200 homes built last year and 16,600 units in 2006.
The government will boost land supply and begin a rent-to-buy program for first-time buyers, Hong Kong Chief Executive Donald Tsang (曾蔭權) pledged last week in his policy address after a public outcry over a surge in home prices of about 48 percent since the beginning of last year.
“The government is determined to boost land supply and we can expect more plots up for auctions,” said Buggle Lau (劉嘉輝), chief analyst at Midland Holdings Ltd (美聯集團), Hong Kong’s biggest publicly traded property broker.
“It won’t impose an immediate pressure on home prices as this would take time,” Lau added.
Tsang said he expects sufficient land would be made available for about 20,000 new homes in a year.
The government has held eight land auctions in the current financial year, with the next one scheduled for Nov. 3.
The number of private homes on which construction began more than doubled in January through last month to 11,700 from a year earlier, according to the bureau’s report.
Lau said home prices may increase another 15 percent by the end of next year should interest rates remain at current levels.
The Hong Kong Monetary Authority has kept its base rate at a record-low 0.5 percent since December 2008, leading to reduced home-loan costs.
Monetary policy decisions track those of the US Federal Reserve because the city’s currency is pegged to the US dollar.
A housing bubble poses the biggest threat to financial stability in Asia, Norman Chan (陳德霖), chief executive of the territory’s de facto central bank, said on Monday.
Hong Kong will stop offering residency to foreigners who buy properties in the city, Tsang said on Wednesday last week.
The latest curbs follow a series of measures announced this year to rein in home prices that have surged on the back of record-low mortgage rates and an influx of buyers from the Chinese mainland.
The government in August raised downpayment ratios and said it will sell more land for development.
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