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JOB SEEKERS LOOKING FOR opportunities in Hong Kong's real estate market have more to choose from this year. A rosier economy has helped strengthen the industry.

The property and construction  industry has been on shaky ground for four years due to oversupply and the Sars outbreak.

Today, increasingly optimistic market players using real estate investment trusts (reits) and wholesale investment funds to boost the coffers  are now looking for staff. They are offering higher salaries to  get the best candidates.

Real estate and money management firm Jones Lang LaSalle is increasing  its Hong Kong workforce by 9 per cent this year and is  looking for portfolio, property and facility managers as well as sales, leasing and booking staff. The company is also seeking staff at the director level.

Its North Asia human resources director, Elsie Hui, said companies were trying to fill positions not offered  during a flat recruiting period last year.

'There's some pretty urgent hiring going on to make up for conservative recruitment plans last year. There's also a fair bit of musical chairs being played at the moment among companies,' Ms Hui said.

Joel Donnelly, director for real estate recruitment company Judd Farris Asia, said this pattern could be found all the way through the real estate market. '[The job market] is a lot better than it was 18 months to two years ago.'

He said there were a lot of opportunities in construction and leasing with more emphasis shifting from Hong Kong to the mainland.

An improved residential sector was one of the key drivers behind the new optimism. Take up of new and second-hand apartments  was stronger than in previous years, with buyers purchasing 800 units of 1,797 offered in four projects across Hong Kong.

Jones Lang LaSalle's head of Kowloon commercial markets, Fiona Ngan, said the trend should continue as a number of projects were still being negotiated.

The leasing and rental market started slowly this year  because of increasing prices on the back of inflation, but analysts said a spate of inquiries in the three months ending April should mean more activity in the next three to four months. Growth in the residential, office and retail market prompted many companies to launch a number of reits and wholesale investment funds to finance projects in Hong Kong and on the mainland.

While the market has not been kind to reits in the past month, with  three major projects being put on hold, some commentators said the market had hit rock bottom in recent years and now could only go up.

Ms Hui said Jones Lang LaSalle was  planning to move  further into the investment side of the business and was looking for project managers, analysts and other staff to help it develop investment real estate operations. Mr Donnelly said acquisitions people, asset managers, analysts and project managers were increasingly sought after as more companies turned to reits for capital for Hong Kong and mainland projects.

'Companies want to fill any role that will help drive the financial performance and provide stronger yields for reits,' he said.  Mr Donnelly said real estate companies were looking for staff with excellent Putonghua, Cantonese and English skills, as well as commercial experience.

'Developers, institutions and agencies are looking across the board for good people, particularly those that have a proven track record and experience transacting in China.'

The creation of new office space in East Kowloon has also helped push the market forward this year. While companies in the financial sector look like staying on Hong Kong Island, other businesses are moving increasingly to East Kowloon where large new grade-A office space is becoming available.

Ms Ngan said this trend would probably continue as seven new office blocks would be  completed in Kwun Tong and Kowloon Bay  in the next two years.

The retail real estate market, however, is having a very mixed year; consumer spending is up but high rents are making some retailers think twice about continuing leases. Retail rents have gone up 2.2 per cent. Raymond Lo, associate director of Perpetual Property Agency, said while vacancies were still low at prime locations they were up by as much as 10 per cent at others.

'The rental price is too steep for smaller retailers in some locations,' he said.

A Jones Lang LaSalle report, however, found the picture was not all gloomy, with a number of retailers opening up in old residential sites and smaller shops in Mongkok and Causeway Bay.



Industry builds on optimism