Housing News
- SZ housing prices may drop 40%
Date: 13-Nov-2007 Sources: (Shenzhen Daily)
THE impact of government policy measures may trigger a 40 percent decline in housing prices in Shenzhen, the China Business News reported yesterday quoting an insider.
Li Yaozhi, general manager of Shenzhen Centaline Property Consultants Ltd. said prices were likely to dip to the same level as at the end of last year.
The continuing slowdown in property transactions in the past four months had eased prices in the once red-hot Shenzhen real estate market and forced intermediate agencies to adjust their businesses.
Sales of new residential homes dropped 16 percent in September, month on month, according to the local housing management authority. The situation was even worse in October, with less than 60 new homes being sold daily, down 51.2 percent compared with September. At the same time, it is favoring buyers in the secondary market.
This is compared with a heated seller's market earlier this year when housing prices rocketed from 9,000 yuan (US$1,214.57) per square meter to 15,000 yuan per sqm in nine months. Transactions of pre-owned homes in April, May and June also hit record highs of 6,000 to 8,000 units a month.
Property consultant agencies are the first to feel the pain, with many facing closure of their outlets that once mushroomed in the city.
A manager of a well-known agency told reporters that his company had handled 100 units a day in the first half of the year, but was now handling only two or three a day.
Another factor forcing consultants to shut down is pressure from the rising rents of their outlets. Industry insiders revealed that rents had increased by 20 percent in recent months.
Liang Wenhua, general manager of the Shi Hua property consultant company, estimated that a total of 6,000 employees were forced out of the industry in October. The figures for July, August and September were about 1,600, 2,800 and 5,000, respectively.
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