The new year has got off to a flying start for Hong Kong's property market, with sales surging to a two-year high last week.
Data collated by Ricacorp Properties shows 730 sales and purchase agreements were signed in the city's 50 major housing estates in the week to January 17, up from 614 in the previous week and the most recorded in the past 105 weeks.
Prices rose 1.1 per cent during the week, taking the cumulative increase in the average prices of secondary-market deals in the past two months to 4 per cent, the data shows.
'There is no particular reason for the rise. Buyers just feel good about the market outlook,' said Patrick Chow Moon-kit, the head of research at Ricacorp.
'Positive factors that have helped boost sales activity include steady economic development and the recent news that a government site in Tseung Kwan O has been triggered for public auction,' Midland Realty chief analyst Buggle Lau Ka-fai said.
Casting a wider net, data from Hong Kong Property Services (Agency) shows sales agreements for residential, commercial and industrial deals lodged with the Land Registry in the first 15 days of this month were up about 23 per cent month on month to 6,143. The agency expects the number of deals to reach 12,000 this month, the highest since September last year.
The sustained market recovery is fuelled by buyers returning after sitting on the sidelines, agents say.
