Singapore home sales surge to highest in almost four years

Commercial buildings stand in the central business district of Singapore, on Tuesday, Feb. 14, 2017. Bloomberg

SINGAPORE: Singapore home sales surged to the highest monthly total for nearly four years in March, a month in which the government rolled back some property curbs following a three-year slide in prices.

Developers sold 1,780 units in March, the most in a month since June 2013 and more than double the 843 sold in the same period last year, according to data released Monday by the Urban Redevelopment Authority. A total of 1,527 units were offered, almost three times the 550 in February.

The largest sales came from Grandeur Park Residences in the city’s east, which sold 484 units of the 720 put up for sale, and Park Place Residences at PLQ, which sold all 217 units it placed on the market last month.

The government moved in March to relax a raft of measures to cool home prices – steps it began implementing in 2009, with some of the strictest restrictions being imposed in 2013. Home prices fell 3% last year and have dropped for 14 straight quarters, the longest slide since the data was first published in 1975.

An index tracking private residential prices fell 0.5% in the three months ended March from the previous quarter, according to preliminary data from the authority. Home values have dropped 11.7% from their 2013 peak.

In February, Bloomberg reported that Singapore home prices fell 3% in 2016, with prices declining for the 13th straight quarter in the last three months of the year for the longest streak since the data was first published in 1975.

Still, Singapore house sales last year topped 2015’s tally as a third straight year of price declines stoked pent-up demand from homebuyers, it said.

The cooling measures “have helped to achieve a soft landing in the property market,” National Development Minister Lawrence Wong, who’s also the second finance minister, said in a Bloomberg Television interview.

“If you look at the market today, demand remains very resilient.”

Singapore’s government has been steadfast in its commitment to cool the housing market, maintaining real estate curbs rolled out since 2009.

The government has repeatedly signalled it is reluctant to ease property curbs, including capping debt repayments at 60% of a borrower’s income and higher stamp duties, as it wants to avoid overheating the market again, the newswire said. – Bloomberg