Hong Kong investors shun Singapore for homes in Malaysia, Taiwan

SINGAPORE's housing market isn’t turning out to be the beneficiary many may have thought from Hong Kong’s increasingly fraught protests. Instead, investors are looking to cheaper property markets like Malaysia, Thailand and Taiwan.

"People here tend to think there are only two cities in the world -- Hong Kong and Singapore, ” said Alan Cheong, a Singapore-based executive director of research and consultancy at Savills Plc.

"They think if people flee Hong Kong, they’ll all automatically come to Singapore. But everyone isn’t Li Ka-shing. Most are just ordinary salaried workers, ” he said, referring to Hong Kong’s richest billionaire.