Amid weak hiring and businesses planning to restructure their foreign manpower needs, residential leases are still expected to stay afloat throughout the second quarter, said Savills.
With the Additional Buyer’s Stamp Duty (ABSD) and increasing home prices in the background, leasing demand will likely grow continuously, particularly for non-landed homes. In fact, the total number of transactions for January and February soared to over 3,000 each.
February’s 3,446 transactions was way higher than the 2,767 transactions recorded over the same period last year, albeit being five percent lower than the previous quarter.
Rents continuously increased for landed and non-landed residential homes, as well as ECs. February’s rents for non-landed homes inched up to S$3.53 psf, an increase of one percent month-on-month and eight percent year-on-year.
For landed properties, median rents climbed six percent month-on-month to S$2.77 psf, marking a 14 percent rise over one year.
Overall, islandwide median rents during the first two months reached a transaction value of S$35 million, 15 percent above the previous year’s figures.
According to Alan Cheong, Head of Research and Consultancy at Savills Singapore, the price increase may be attributed to the issue of expatriate manpower. “With a continual relocation of expatriates from troubled economies, leasing demand continues to strengthen here, putting greater upward pressure on rents.”
On the contrary, high-end, non-landed residential properties saw average monthly rents plunging two percent to S$5.17 in Q1 2012. This means that prime rents slid five percent from Q1 2011’s S$5.45 psf per month.
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