Hong Kong property

As a landlord trying sell your property at the moment you may be interested in some comments made in an article in the SCMP last week A Ricacorp recent survey suggest that Owners of flats in the 10 biggest private housing estatesin Hong Kong yesterday cut asking prices by an average of 3.2 per cent amid the changing global financial landscape The company’s research found thatprices fell by 7 to 10 per cent in Kornhill, Heng Fa Chuen and Sunshine Cityin Ma On Shan. In Happy Valley, Tiona Li, senior district manager of Ricacorp Properties, said the owner of a luxury flat in the area had cut the asking price by HK$1 million to HK$18 million. Jessy Ng, district manager of Ricacorp in Quarry Bay, said: “Since the beginning of this month, flat owners are no longer optimistic about the economic outlook. They are insecure and willing to cut asking prices further after the collapse of Lehman Brothers.” There were about 330 flats in Kornhill on the secondary market. Mr Ng said the average asking price had fallen by about 8 per cent since early this month. Centaline Properties contacted flat owners in Island East to ask whether they would cut their asking prices after yesterday’s stock market slump. Patrick Tsang, senior district director at Centaline Properties, said: “More than half of the flat owners in the district are willing to cut their asking prices by 5 to 10 per cent.” “We’re seeing this in Taikoo Shing, Kornhill, and also at Grand Promenade [in Sai Wan Ho].” Raymond Szeto, a manager of Hong Kong Property, said: “A flat owner in Kornhill cut his asking price by 9.79 per cent to HK$3.5 million from HK$3.88 million this morning.” At Grand Waterfront in To Kwa Wan an investor cut the asking price for a 1,239 sq ft flat from HK$10 million to HK$9.2 million, Hong Kong Property said. But despite falling prices, Mr Szeto said potential buyers were still cautious. Marco Yu, associate director at Centaline, estimated that about 3 per cent of flat owners had started cutting asking prices by 3 per cent to 5 per cent early yesterday. He said transactions had been falling significantly since the start of last month. Centaline Holdings chairman Shih Wing-ching said the Hong Kong property market was facing a correction. “The latest US financial crisis is even more serious than the Asian financial crisis in 1997 and 1998,” he said. However, he did not believe prices would drop sharply because they had not increased as much as they had before the handover in 1997. “The average property price is only 75 per cent of the peak [prices] of 1997, ” Mr Shih said. He expected property prices to drop by an average 8 per cent across the board. So as landlord how to maximize your profit? Well one way is to try and sell your property privately here on 852realestate.com we are the most visited property site in Hong Kong by far. If you put your property on this site its a free advert and you could save thousands of dollars in commissions. You maybe surprised at hoe easy it is.The only thing you really need to do is ask your solicitor for a preliminary sales and purchase agreement which could be drawn up at very little cost . Then when you have negotiated a sale you and the prospective client can sign the legal paperwork without having an agent involved.Your solicitor will then draw up the actual sales and purchase agreement. Its all relatively simple just contact your solicitor first. So if you dont have an advert with us yet perhaps you should? Landlords already with us may want to update thier property detials remember the more photos and more detailed description you put in your advert the better response you will get Login HERE

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If you want to be a player in the Hong Kong property market, you’d best read what follows carefully, because it’s one crazy game. Here’s the first problem: property in Hong Kong is grossly expensive. That’s fine, you say — once you can afford some, it’ll appreciate in value, and you’ll have a nice safe fat investment on your lucre-dripping hands. Well, maybe in normal places, but not here. First off, we’ve got this little property market crash/recession problem going. This too shall pass — we hope — but the days of buying a flat for HKD500,000 and selling it ten years later for 5 million are gone, and simply won’t be back. Here’s the next problem: even if your property eventually appreciates in value, you’d better not get too attached to it, because once it’s old enough for the paint to be fully dry people are going to start turning their noses up at the very thought of buying it. This is a unique — and intensely irritating — feature of the Hong Kong market. In other places, people often ask ‘How old is this building?’ as an aside, finding it charming or even value-enhancing to know they’d be living in an art-deco era apartment tower, or a sturdy nineteenth-century brick house, or even a 400-year-old stone cottage, as you might find in the UK. But here, a block of flats that’s 10 years old is already suspect, and many potential buyers won’t even set foot in a flat that’s 20 years old or more. ‘How old is it’ is just about the first question many buyers consider, and becomes the primary criterion for winnowing through properties for sale. This is a handy tool when you’re buying, but its common usage becomes increasingly disturbing as one owns and occupies a Hong Kong flat. We Hong Kong homeowners have to ask ourselves: how long can I hope to live in my flat before no one will ever want to buy it if I decide to move? As if these problems weren’t enough, we’ve now got to consider the Hong Kong Government’s price-fixing strategies. What?! — you exclaim — isn’t Hong Kong the bastion of the free market, the world center of laissez-faire capitalism? Well, yes, but there are a few exceptions. The Government here has a two-handed stranglehold on the property market. First, it owns nearly all of the land that could conceivably be built upon. It can, at its whim, release parcels of that land for sale, thereby affecting the market directly. In addition, the Government supplies huge numbers of public-housing flats for rent, and also sells highly subsidized properties as well. This is great if you qualify to live in or buy one of these flats (the Byzantine regulations controlling access to these privileges are too depressing and complex to get into here) but if you own a lower-cost flat (as Mr and Mrs Tall do), and the Government suddenly undercuts the market by flooding it with similarly-priced but newer flats, what can you do but grin and share the joy of your fellow Hong Kong citizens who are in buying mode? So: is there any way to win at the Hong Kong property game, you ask? Yes, I can assure you there is. My wife and I have just bought a new flat, in a brand-new building - so new, in fact, that it’s not even close to being done yet. If all goes well, and the building is indeed completed more or less to plan, the word is that our pre-purchased property will immediately appreciate in value upon its completion (i.e. because an existing property is de facto worth more than a brochure and a mock-up). So, if you want to make money in the Hong Kong property market, you can simply follow these easy steps: 1 Buy a flat that doesn’t yet exist. 2 Wait until it does. 3 Sell it immediately. What? There’s a problem with this plan? Oh, yes - someplace to actually live. You can’t rent, of course, because that would eat up your profits. Fortunately, Hong Kong is liberally blessed with flyovers, so I’ll see you in one of those cozy nooks beneath them! Hong Kong Property sales

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