Upbeat Telok plans more projects in Macau
Developer sells existing projects and sees growing demand despite tighter lending rules
Hong Kong-based investment fund Telok Real Estate Partners is looking to add two more projects to its portfolio in Macau, where it expects home prices to continue rising in the face of a severe supply shortfall over the next two years.
Despite the Macau government tightening mortgage lending policies and introducing a 10 per cent buyer's stamp duty to curb investment demand in October, the fund has found buyers for all the units in three existing projects, generating HK$800 million.
The projects, which are due to be completed over the next two years, are the 160-unit Cerese; the 32-unit Casa Verde; and the 30-unit Lazarus Verde. The units were sold for between HK$3 million and HK$4 million, or HK$6,000 to HK$6,500 per square foot.
Telok partner Philip Pang said the fund had been negotiating land deals to develop one or two more projects.
"We will focus on developing projects that cater for first-time homebuyers and up-graders, with selling prices of between HK$3 million and HK$4 million," he said.
The fund has committed HK$590 million of its estimated HK$1 billion investment target to building up to 20 small- to medium- sized residential projects by 2015.
Pang said he remained upbeat about the outlook for Macau's residential market despite the measures to curb investment demand. He said there were just 4,600 new units in the pipeline between now and 2015, or 1,547 a year.