Transactions involving residential and commercial properties in Taiwan could fall to a new low this year as buying interest, particularly in northern Taiwan, remains weak, analysts said on Saturday.
Transactions of homes, shops and offices this year are likely to reach only 250,000 units or fewer, compared with 292,550 units last year, they said.
However, the local property market could stage a technical rebound next year, as it has been undergoing a correction for a long time, analysts added.
In the first 11 months of this year, transactions of residential and commercial housing totaled 197,201 units, according to statistics released by the Ministry of the Interior.
Although the fourth quarter is a traditional peak season for the property market, it is still unlikely to offset the impact of the slowdown in the previous three quarters and transactions for the whole year are unlikely to bounce back, analysts said.
Tseng Ching-der (曾敬德), a research manager with Sinyi Realty Inc (信義房屋), was downbeat about the local property market for this year based on existing sales records nationwide and especially those for the six major municipalities, which serve as an indicator to the Taiwan property market as a whole.
Tseng said that the local property market remained tepid, with transactions in the six major municipalities — Taipei, New Taipei City, Taoyuan, Taichung, Tainan and Kaohsiung — having been stagnant so far this year.
In the first 11 months of this year, housing transactions in the six cities generally trended lower, with sales in Taipei, New Taipei City, Taichung, Tainan and Kaohsiung down 21 percent, 11 percent, 19 percent, 14 percent and 6 percent respectively from a year earlier.
Taoyuan was the only one of the six cities to register an increase, recording a 7 percent year-on-year increase in housing transactions during the period. Last month, housing transactions in Taipei fell 2.5 percent from a month earlier.
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