The number of unoccupied houses nationwide totaled 876,000 units last year, or 11.94 percent of all houses, the Ministry of the Interior said in a report issued on Thursday.
Almost 30 percent of empty houses were owned by companies, suggesting that many corporate property owners engage in house hoarding, the ministry said.
Excluding developers and builders, companies still owned 20 percent of empty houses, it said.
Photo: CNA
The report is based on housing units’ electricity use and considers properties that use less than 60 kilowatt-hours per month as unoccupied.
The study contradicts Ministry of Finance reports saying that house hoarding subsided and there is no need for housing tax increases.
To rein in property price increases due to house hoarding, the central bank in March capped the loan-to-value ratio at 40 percent for firms and 50 percent for individuals buying their fourth or more.
The interior ministry found that New Taipei City had the highest number of unoccupied houses at 152,000, followed by Kaohsiung with 117,000; Taichung with 105,000; Taoyuan with 102,000; Tainan with 78,000; and Taipei with 68,000.
The report said that 33.47 percent of corporate-owned empty houses were held by companies that owned more than 10 houses.
Individual owners of more than 10 houses held 18.74 percent of all empty houses, it said.
A domestic COVID-19 outbreak in May prompted the central bank to postpone planned measures to rein in house hoarding, even though property and construction lending continued to rise, defying expectations of a downturn.
Separately, Miaoli County-based tile producer Champion Building Materials Co (冠軍建材) yesterday said that it is seeking to reverse losses this year by expanding its domestic market share and booking income from the sale of a production facility in China.
Champion last year incurred losses of NT$403 million (US$14.41 million), or losses per share of NT$0.93, the company told its annual general meeting in Jhunan Township (竹南) on Tuesday, citing sharp competition from low-end producers.
However, the situation might improve this year, as Champion sold an idle production facility in Kunshan, China, amid rising real-estate prices in the emerging high-tech production hub, it said.
The transaction generated NT$1.08 billion in profit, it said.
Revenue contribution from Champion’s China business was 25 percent last year, while the rest came from the domestic market, the company said.
WEAKER ACTIVITY: The sharpest deterioration was seen in the electronics and optical components sector, with the production index falling 13.2 points to 44.5 Taiwan’s manufacturing sector last month contracted for a second consecutive month, with the purchasing managers’ index (PMI) slipping to 48, reflecting ongoing caution over trade uncertainties, the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday. The decline reflects growing caution among companies amid uncertainty surrounding US tariffs, semiconductor duties and automotive import levies, and it is also likely linked to fading front-loading activity, CIER president Lien Hsien-ming (連賢明) said. “Some clients have started shifting orders to Southeast Asian countries where tariff regimes are already clear,” Lien told a news conference. Firms across the supply chain are also lowering stock levels to mitigate
Six Taiwanese companies, including contract chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), made the 2025 Fortune Global 500 list of the world’s largest firms by revenue. In a report published by New York-based Fortune magazine on Tuesday, Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), ranked highest among Taiwanese firms, placing 28th with revenue of US$213.69 billion. Up 60 spots from last year, TSMC rose to No. 126 with US$90.16 billion in revenue, followed by Quanta Computer Inc (廣達) at 348th, Pegatron Corp (和碩) at 461st, CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) at 494th and Wistron Corp (緯創) at
NEGOTIATIONS: Semiconductors play an outsized role in Taiwan’s industrial and economic development and are a major driver of the Taiwan-US trade imbalance With US President Donald Trump threatening to impose tariffs on semiconductors, Taiwan is expected to face a significant challenge, as information and communications technology (ICT) products account for more than 70 percent of its exports to the US, Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) president Lien Hsien-ming (連賢明) said on Friday. Compared with other countries, semiconductors play a disproportionately large role in Taiwan’s industrial and economic development, Lien said. As the sixth-largest contributor to the US trade deficit, Taiwan recorded a US$73.9 billion trade surplus with the US last year — up from US$47.8 billion in 2023 — driven by strong
ASE Technology Holding Co (ASE, 日月光投控), the world’s biggest chip assembly and testing service provider, yesterday said it would boost equipment capital expenditure by up to 16 percent for this year to cope with strong customer demand for artificial intelligence (AI) applications. Aside from AI, a growing demand for semiconductors used in the automotive and industrial sectors is to drive ASE’s capacity next year, the Kaohsiung-based company said. “We do see the disparity between AI and other general sectors, and that pretty much aligns the scenario in the first half of this year,” ASE chief operating officer Tien Wu (吳田玉) told an
RSS