Sun Hung Kai raises price of Victoria Harbour flats by up to HK$1.5 million, shrugs off Beijing’s rebuke on unaffordable housing
- Hong Kong’s biggest developer increased the price of six flats at the luxury housing project in North Point by up to 7 per cent from the previous announcement
Sun Hung Kai Properties, Hong Kong’s biggest developer, has raised the price of flats at its Victoria Harbour project by up to HK$1.5 million (US$191,000), even as Beijing singled out the city’s unaffordable housing as a “root cause” behind the anti-government protests.
On Friday, SHKP put six units at the luxury development in the city’s North Point district on the market, raising the price by up to 7 per cent from the originally announced price. The price increase ranges from around HK$320,000 to HK$1.5 million for the biggest flat.
The company could not be reached for comment as to why they had raised the selling price.
SHKP has priced a 286 sq ft unit – the smallest on offer – at nearly HK$11 million after discounts, or HK$38,159 per sq ft.
In comparison, a 265 sq ft flat at The Consonance in North Point was priced at HK$8 million, or HK$30,268 per sq ft, when it was launched in April.
A slightly bigger 364 sq ft unit saw the steepest price increase, rising HK$1.3 million or 7 per cent from HK$18.1 million in April to HK$19.4 million.
There are a total of 355 units in SHKP’s residential scheme. The developer won the waterfront site, formerly occupied by North Point Estates, in 2012 for HK$6.91 billion, or HK$9,347 per sq ft.
Commentaries published last Friday by the official Xinhua news agency, mouthpiece People’s Daily and the hardline tabloid Global Times, identified the inability of young people and low-income groups to afford homes and share the city’s economic success as an underlying cause of the social unrest that has rocked the city since early June.
The three news organisations also called on Hong Kong’s embattled government to be more proactive, and they also hit out at developers.
This has added more pressure on Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor to tackle the city’s housing problems.
“Developers will not adjust home prices just because of the warnings by Beijing,” said Andy Kwan Cheuk-chiu, director of ACE Centre for Business and Economic Research, an independent Hong Kong-based think tank. “Home prices are set on the basis of demand and supply. Hong Kong is a free economy. It may work in China, but not here.”
However, Kwan said he backed the government to use the Lands Resumption Ordinance to seize private land.
“The government has been reluctant to use the ordinance as the move will come under big pressure from interest groups,” said Kwan.
The law has been used before to free up land. Now, as the protests have put the spotlight on the lack of affordable housing, the possibility of using it has resurfaced.
Agents said no flats had been sold as of late Friday.
