Housing transactions in the nation’s six special municipalities last month grew 11.3 percent from one month earlier to 23,810 units, as the local COVID-19 situation eased further, government data released on Monday showed.
The volume represented a 9.3 percent increase from a year earlier, as the real-estate market received a boost from an extended economic boom, ample liquidity and low borrowing costs, analysts said.
In New Taipei City, the special municipality that showed the greatest growth, transactions jumped 22.7 percent month-on-month to 6,425 units, which Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房屋) researcher Chen Chin-ping (陳金萍) attributed to pent-up demand from people who had postponed purchases after a local COVID-19 outbreak began in mid-May.
Photo: Ho Yu-hua, Taipei Times
Developers wrapped up construction on new housing projects in Sinjhuang (新莊), Tucheng (土城) and Sijhih (汐止) districts, driving up transactions in New Taipei City in the month, she said.
However, Chen said that last month’s data mainly reflected deals taking place one month earlier, meaning that the market needed more time to digest policy changes that the central bank announced on Sept. 23, which bar lenders from granting grace periods on second-home purchases in the six special municipalities, as well as Hsinchu county and city.
Transactions in Taoyuan rose 17.9 percent month-on-month to 4,426 units, while transactions increased 9.1 percent to 4,375 units in Taichung and 10.9 percent to 4,079 units in Kaohsiung, the data showed.
Taipei and Tainan bucked the uptrend, with transactions falling 1.6 percent to 2,447 units in Taipei and 7.3 percent to 2,058 units in Tainan, the data showed.
Overall, the six municipalities reported transactions of 213,994 units in the first 10 months of the year, up 7.3 percent from a year earlier, the data showed.
PEAK SALES SEASON
Housing transactions nationwide reached 249,000 units in the first three quarters, with the figure expected to surpass 343,000 units for the whole of this year, as the fourth quarter is the peak sales season, Sinyi Realty Inc (信義房屋) research manager Tseng Ching-der (曾進德) said.
In related news, a survey released yesterday by London-based property consultancy Knight Frank LLP found that the COVID-19 pandemic has made people worldwide more willing to buy a second home, in a bid to relocate to a larger house with a lower risk of contracting COVID-19 and to pursue a more balanced lifestyle.
About 64 percent of respondents are looking at price hikes in real-estate properties in the next 12 months, up from 56 percent last year, the results showed.
Thirty-three percent said they were more likely to buy a second home as a result of the pandemic, while 39 percent were willing to pay more for a branded residence.
SECOND-HOME SALES
The findings explain why housing in suburban and second-tier locations at home and abroad are selling, Knight Frank Taiwan researcher Andy Huang (黃舒衛) said, adding that property prices in Tainan and Kaohsiung have spiked over the past few years.
The trend also explains why the number of households in Taipei has dropped this year, Huang said, adding that the outflow is most evident in Taipei’s central districts, such as Daan (大安), Xinyi (信義), Songshan (松山), Zhongzheng (中正) and Zhongshan (中山).
The survey also showed that people are willing to buy studios or small apartments for work on weekdays, Huang said.
Demand for smaller housing units might gain momentum in Taiwan, where low birthrates have dampened the need for large housing units, Huang added.
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