Singapore condo resale prices hold steady in August, sales volume down: SRX

Tue, Sep 10, 2019

VIVIENNE TAY


SINGAPORE resale condominium and apartment prices remain unchanged for the month of August, while volume of sales fell, according to monthly figures from real estate portal SRX Property released on Tuesday.

Overall condo resale prices remained unchanged in August from the previous month. July had seen a 0.5 per cent decline from June, which also saw a drop.

Sales volume fell by 13.6 per cent with 751 units transacted in August, compared with 869 units resold in July.

This could be attributed to a "double whammy" of growing economic uncertainties as well as the Chinese lunar seventh month in August, said OrangeTee & Tie’s head of research and consultancy, Christine Sun.

That being said, sales volumes are still above the 12-month average of 702 units from August 2018 to July 2019, she added. Taking a longer-term view, they are 1.7 per cent lower than the five-year average volume for August, SRX noted.

By price segments, 78.8 per cent of sales volumes came from units under S$2 million, 15.8 per cent from units in the S$2 million to S$5 million range, 4 per cent from the S$5 million to S$10 million range and 1.4 per cent from condos priced above S$10 million.

Prices in the city fringes, or the rest of central region (RCR), saw the highest increase of 1.1 per cent in the month, while prices for the core central region (CCR) were up 0.4 per cent. Meanwhile, the outside central region (OCR) saw a price drop of 0.9 per cent.

Year on year, overall resale prices increased 0.2 per cent. The RCR saw a price increase of 1.9 per cent, while the OCR inched up 0.1 per cent. Meanwhile, the CCR saw a price drop of 2.2 per cent.

The most expensive condo resold in August was Le Nouvel Ardmore, where a unit was sold for S$15.7 million at S$4,000 price per square foot.

In the RCR, the highest transacted price was a six-bedroom penthouse unit at Sennett Residence resold for $5.5 million. Meanwhile in OCR, the highest transacted price was a 35-year-old, freehold unit at Thomson Grove which was resold for S$2.7 million.

Ms Sun added that resale home prices in CCR and RCR have "risen in tandem" with higher launch prices of new projects in these market segments. The new launches' higher prices could be due to their freehold status, better quality finishing, as well as being situated in choice locations. "Some projects were also acquired at higher land costs during the last collective sales cycle," she added.

Overall transaction over X-value (TOX) was found to be negative S$10,000 in August, an improvement from negative S$11,000 in July. TOX measures how much a buyer is overpaying (positive value) or underpaying (negative value) for a property based on SRX’s computer-generated market value. The data only includes districts with more than 10 resale transactions.

The highest median TOX was recorded in District 4’s Sentosa and Harbourfront, with a positive S$45,600 value. This is followed by District 3’s Alexandra and Commonwealth with a positive S$15,000 value.

On the other hand, the area with the lowest median TOX was District 10’s Tanglin, Holland and Bukit Timah which posted a negative S$91,000 value, followed by District 8’s Farrer Park and Serangoon Road at negative S$49,000.