Housing prices swung into positive territory in the second quarter with a modest 1.2 percent annual increase, but the growth still lagged behind the global average rise of 5.6 percent, statistics released yesterday by international property consultancy Knight Frank showed.
“Housing prices nationwide have stabilized after the government quit unfavorable policies,” Knight Frank Taipei-based research associate director Andy Huang (黃舒衛) said in a report.
Low interest rates helped spur buying interest and lent support to housing prices, explaining an 18.9 percent annual jump in housing transactions in the first six months of this year, he said.
Home prices in greater Taipei continued to decline, but at a marginal pace of 1 percent, in the April-to-June quarter, with the number of transactions in the area accounting for less than 33 percent of total transactions nationwide, Huang said.
Housing prices elsewhere in the nation gained more than 2 percent in the quarter, as prices of upscale housing units found support, while those of middle and low-priced homes staged a modest comeback, the report said.
Looking ahead, the domestic property market might stay flat for the rest of the year, as the central bank is unlikely to raise interest rates due to the nation’s economic fundamentals and the government has no reason to adopt unfavorable measures in the near term, Huang said.
A lack of affordability and limited wage increases might continue to weigh on the nation’s potential home buyers, while property investors have largely fled from the local market, he said.
Housing prices nationwide picked up 17 percent in the past five years, Huang said, citing the government’s real-price transaction platform data.
Taiwan ranked 44th in a survey of 55 nations, the Knight Frank report said, behind South Korea in 43rd place with a 1.3 percent annual increase in housing prices last quarter.
Iceland topped the survey with a 23.2 percent increase in the period, thanks to its fast-growing popularity as a global tourist destination, the report said.
With a population of 344,000 people, Iceland only has 130,000 housing units, but attracted 1.7 million tourists from around the world, the report said.
China ranked 12th with a 9.6 percent increase in home prices, while Japan finished 50th as home prices contracted 0.2 percent from the same period last year, the report said.
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