For home buyers unsure how to bargain for a pre-sale apartment, asking for a 20 percent discount off the listed price may be a fair outcome, at least according to the Ministry of the Interior’s latest property transaction data, published on Friday.
Pre-sale homes and apartments — referring to properties put on the market before they are built — were sold across the nation at prices about 20 percent lower on average than the advertised price, according to property transaction data posted for October.
It was the first time that the ministry had posted transaction information on pre-sale residential properties since its real-estate transaction data service was launched in October.
Only transaction information on existing homes was posted on the Web site in its first two months of operation.
Information relating to transactions in a certain month is posted on the site two months later in the middle of the month, which is why October sales data appeared for the first time on Friday.
In Taipei’s Zhongzheng District (中正), apartments in one new complex currently under construction sold for between NT$640,000 and NT$680,000 per ping (about US$22,000 to US$23,400), compared with an asking price of NT$800,000 per ping (3.3m2), according to the databank.
In New Taipei City (新北市), a riverside park development in which units were offered for between NT$370,000 and NT$430,000 per ping sold for an average of between NT$280,000 and NT$360,000 per ping, the data showed.
Units in a pre-sale project in Hsinchu City advertised at NT$250,000 per ping were sold for NT$200,000 to NT$220,000 per ping, the Web site showed.
Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房屋) manager Andy Huang (黃舒衛) said the new Web site will help close the information gap between buyers and developers and boost the Taiwanese housing market.
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