Data from the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) showed sales of private homes dropped almost 35 percent this month from January 2014, despite recording a month-on-month increase of 62 percent.
With many units left unsold from prior launches, OrangeTee Research & Consultancy predicts a wave of relaunches may hit the market in 2015.
“With demand expected to be capped due to cooling measures and increasing new supply coming in from new and existing launches, developers should try to time their launches strategically to prevent launching into an overly competitive market,” it said in a report.
New sales volumes are expected to pick up after Lunar New Year, as buyers start house hunting after the festivities. As such, many developers have held back new launches and instead preferred to strategise for a launch after February, according to OrangeTee.
Additionally, any price cut of more than 10 percent for homes in the city fringe and prime districts will result in better sales in some of the relaunched properties, as investors will only enter the market when the property is perceived to be below market price so as to mitigate any downside risk, said Cushman and Wakefield’s Director of Research Christine Li.
With no changes to the government curbs on the horizon this year, the private residential market is expected to remain soft, and any sustained sales pickup would be reined in by rules on lending, according to PropNex. Its CEO Mohamed Ismail Gafoor expects the property market to remain relatively quiet at least in the first quarter of 2015, and new private home sales volume for the whole year is likely to around 9,000 units.
Muneerah Bee, Senior Journalist at PropertyGuru, wrote this story. To contact her about this or other stories email muneerah@propertyguru.com.sg
