Property transactions in the six special municipalities climbed to 23,413 units last month, rising by double-digit percentage points from a year earlier, as preferential interest rates spurred buying among people with real demand and storefronts showed an uptick, brokers said yesterday.
The pickup was broad-based, but most evident in southern Taiwan, where fence-sitters took action to close deals, Great Home Realty Co (大家房屋) research head Mandy Lang (郎美囡) said.
Transactions in Tainan and Kaohsiung jumped 18.3 percent from one month earlier to 3,198 and 3,502 units respectively, helped by new house deliveries and first-home purchases, Lang said.
Photo: CNA
The pace of gains, at 98.6 percent in Tainan and 29.3 percent in Kaohsiung, was much stronger compared with a year earlier, as the two southern cities benefitted from high-tech firms’ capacity expansions, the analyst added.
Property deals expanded 15.5 percent to 4,299 units in Taichung and rose 14.7 percent to 3,931 units in Taoyuan, local government agencies said on their Web site, as improving infrastructure and relatively affordability continued to lend support.
Transactions in Taipei advanced 8.1 percent from one month earlier and edged up 1.5 percent in New Taipei City, local statistics showed.
The introduction of preferential rates for first-home purchases by the Cabinet played a key role in facilitating the sentiment change, Lang said, adding that the central bank’s decision to keep interest rates unchanged in June and September also helped.
The central bank is due to review its policy rates in two weeks after leaving room in September for renewed tightening to curb inflation if necessary. Consumer prices climbed above the 3 percent mark in October, but might return to the central bank’s 2 percent target next year.
H&B Realty Co (住商不動產) chief researcher Jessica Hsu (徐佳馨) said she observed a pickup in buying interest for small storefronts and office spaces, as they can generate stable and regular rent income, but do not require large capital.
Such objects have become bright spots for individual buyers as companies need to obtain government approval before going through the deals, Hsu said.
On Ireland’s blustery western seaboard, researchers are gleefully flying giant kites — not for fun, but in the hope of generating renewable electricity and sparking a “revolution” in wind energy. “We use a kite to capture the wind and a generator at the bottom of it that captures the power,” said Padraic Doherty of Kitepower, the Dutch firm behind the venture. At its test site in operation since September 2023 near the small town of Bangor Erris, the team transports the vast 60-square-meter kite from a hangar across the lunar-like bogland to a generator. The kite is then attached by a
Foxconn Technology Co (鴻準精密), a metal casing supplier owned by Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), yesterday announced plans to invest US$1 billion in the US over the next decade as part of its business transformation strategy. The Apple Inc supplier said in a statement that its board approved the investment on Thursday, as part of a transformation strategy focused on precision mold development, smart manufacturing, robotics and advanced automation. The strategy would have a strong emphasis on artificial intelligence (AI), the company added. The company said it aims to build a flexible, intelligent production ecosystem to boost competitiveness and sustainability. Foxconn
Leading Taiwanese bicycle brands Giant Manufacturing Co (巨大機械) and Merida Industry Co (美利達工業) on Sunday said that they have adopted measures to mitigate the impact of the tariff policies of US President Donald Trump’s administration. The US announced at the beginning of this month that it would impose a 20 percent tariff on imported goods made in Taiwan, effective on Thursday last week. The tariff would be added to other pre-existing most-favored-nation duties and industry-specific trade remedy levy, which would bring the overall tariff on Taiwan-made bicycles to between 25.5 percent and 31 percent. However, Giant did not seem too perturbed by the
TARIFF CONCERNS: Semiconductor suppliers are tempering expectations for the traditionally strong third quarter, citing US tariff uncertainty and a stronger NT dollar Several Taiwanese semiconductor suppliers are taking a cautious view of the third quarter — typically a peak season for the industry — citing uncertainty over US tariffs and the stronger New Taiwan dollar. Smartphone chip designer MediaTek Inc (聯發科技) said that customers accelerated orders in the first half of the year to avoid potential tariffs threatened by US President Donald Trump’s administration. As a result, it anticipates weaker-than-usual peak-season demand in the third quarter. The US tariff plan, announced on April 2, initially proposed a 32 percent duty on Taiwanese goods. Its implementation was postponed by 90 days to July 9, then
RSS