YESTERDAY'S astonishing public auction results provide clear signals that politics has been ignored by developers and that residential prices are set to appreciate further.
Prior to the auction, there were suggestions that residential prices might start falling from their existing high levels amid worries about the escalating Sino-British row on Hong Kong's political reforms and the likely reverse in interest rate movement.
But the record price of $5,600 per square foot paid by Sino Land and the family of Robert Ng Chee-siong for the residential site at Farm Road in Tokwawan proved the negative assessments to be inaccurate.
In converse, the auction results suggest that the percentage of appreciation in home prices anticipated by property tycoons may be as much as 50 per cent, or more, over the next two or three years.
The chance of an ordinary Hong Kong citizen being able to afford to buy a flat is now getting smaller, with local banks lending less in mortgage financing, and with rises in residential price increases largely outpacing salary increments.
Even Hong Kong's richest man, Li Ka-shing, conceded that home prices had hit a level which was beyond the reach of many Hong Kong people.