Grade-A offices in Taipei last year saw the lowest vacancy rates in Greater China and ranked among the best effective rents in the Asia-Pacific region, helped by strong demand from technology and financial firms, property consultancy and broker Jones Lang LaSalle (JLL) Taiwan said.
Vacancy rates in Taipei’s core business districts hovered at about 5 to 10 percent, on par with Singapore, but lower than the average of above 10 percent seen in Shanghai, Beijing and Hong Kong’s Central District, JLL Taiwan managing director Kevin Hou (侯文信) told a media briefing on Thursday last week.
Taipei’s effective rent — the actual rent achieved by landlords after deducting renovation allowances, moving fees and other concessions — beat other first-tier cities in the region, including Tokyo, Hou said.
Photo: CNA
The figure represented the strongest in the post-COVID-19 pandemic era, although rental hikes showed signs of easing in the past two quarters, JLL Taiwan said.
Rent for the full year climbed 1.4 percent to NT$3,203 per ping (3.3m2), the smallest advance in three years, it said.
Rent hit NT$3,708 per ping in the city’s prime Xinyi District (信義) and averaged NT$2,616 and NT$2,546 in the Dunbei (敦北) and Dunnan (敦南) areas respectively, it said, adding that the average in Nangang District (南港) was NT$2,311.
Rent hikes moderated due to the entry of some large-scale office spaces into the market and growing uncertainty about the global economic outlook, Hou said.
As of Dec. 31 last year, the market had taken up 40 percent of the new supply, but there was still 17,000 ping of inventory to be digested, it said, adding that Nangang still had 7,000 ping left in inventory.
Vacancy rates are forecast to rise this year, with an additional 36,000 ping of Grade-A office spaces joining the market after stripping out and refurbishing some office buildings that were originally intended for self-occupancy, Hou said.
Rental rates are likely to slow further this year, as landlords offer concessions to woo corporate tenants, Hou said.
Companies at home and abroad are worried about US president-elect Donald Trump’s threats of tariff hikes after his inauguration next week and have become cautious about spending, he said.
Taipei would remain competitive going forward, with GDP forecast to grow 3.13 percent this year, faster than in Singapore, Hong Kong, South Korea and Japan, said Sherry Wu (吳瑤華), a senior property investment analyst at JLL Taiwan.
The growth forecast suggests a deceleration from last year’s 4.25 percent increase, but remains resilient, Wu said.
To many, Tatu City on the outskirts of Nairobi looks like a success. The first city entirely built by a private company to be operational in east Africa, with about 25,000 people living and working there, it accounts for about two-thirds of all foreign investment in Kenya. Its low-tax status has attracted more than 100 businesses including Heineken, coffee brand Dormans, and the biggest call-center and cold-chain transport firms in the region. However, to some local politicians, Tatu City has looked more like a target for extortion. A parade of governors have demanded land worth millions of dollars in exchange
An Indonesian animated movie is smashing regional box office records and could be set for wider success as it prepares to open beyond the Southeast Asian archipelago’s silver screens. Jumbo — a film based on the adventures of main character, Don, a large orphaned Indonesian boy facing bullying at school — last month became the highest-grossing Southeast Asian animated film, raking in more than US$8 million. Released at the end of March to coincide with the Eid holidays after the Islamic fasting month of Ramadan, the movie has hit 8 million ticket sales, the third-highest in Indonesian cinema history, Film
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC, 台積電) revenue jumped 48 percent last month, underscoring how electronics firms scrambled to acquire essential components before global tariffs took effect. The main chipmaker for Apple Inc and Nvidia Corp reported monthly sales of NT$349.6 billion (US$11.6 billion). That compares with the average analysts’ estimate for a 38 percent rise in second-quarter revenue. US President Donald Trump’s trade war is prompting economists to retool GDP forecasts worldwide, casting doubt over the outlook for everything from iPhone demand to computing and datacenter construction. However, TSMC — a barometer for global tech spending given its central role in the
Alchip Technologies Ltd (世芯), an application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) designer specializing in server chips, expects revenue to decline this year due to sagging demand for 5-nanometer artificial intelligence (AI) chips from a North America-based major customer, a company executive said yesterday. That would be the first contraction in revenue for Alchip as it has been enjoying strong revenue growth over the past few years, benefiting from cloud-service providers’ moves to reduce dependence on Nvidia Corp’s expensive AI chips by building their own AI accelerator by outsourcing chip design. The 5-nanometer chip was supposed to be a new growth engine as the lifecycle
RSS