Residential site in Tuen Mun receives just three bids in worst response to Hong Kong land sale since 2010
- Dismal response to government tender is the latest sign the world’s least affordable housing market is losing its lustre
A small plot of land in the New Territories has received the poorest response since Hong Kong’s government resumed land sales in 2010, in the latest sign the world’s priciest property market is on the wane.
The city’s Lands Department said it had received three bids from developers for the parcel of residential land in Tuen Mun after the tender closed at noon on Friday. No government land sale has received fewer bids in the last eight years.
The dismal response comes just three days after Hong Kong scrapped the sale of a luxury residential site on The Peak as a sliding stock market, rising interest rates and the escalating US-China trade war take a toll on buyers’ appetite.
The site in Tuen Mun has an area of 18,815 square feet, roughly equivalent to four basketball courts. It attracted bids from Sino Land, private firm Jantix Renewal Development and an unidentified company.
“The response was worse than our expectation,” said Victor Lai Kin-fai, a managing director at Centaline Surveyors, who predicted five bidders would compete for the small site.
Last December another site in the New Territories, a 2,160 square-foot plot in Sheung Shui, the smallest plot offered in government tender in a decade, drew 19 bidders. It was sold to Tai Hung Fai Group for HK$130 million.