Hong Kong’s landlords surrender to property glut, cut home rents to tie down quality tenants

Name: Hong Kong’s growing homeless community is feeling the pains of the pandemic
Uploaded: 2022-03-30T01:00:16.000Z
Duration: 4 min 50 s
Description: Hong Kong’s growing homeless community is feeling the pains of the pandemic

Tenants should hunt for bargain rents in areas such as New Territories West, Tseung Kwan O and Kai Tak, industry insiders say

Landlords of lived-in homes might cut rents for tenants they believe to have good backgrounds or jobs

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Lohas Park in Hong Kong’s Tseung Kwan O. The district is among areas where rents are expected to drop further, industry insiders say. Photo: Sun Yeung

Lam Ka-sing

Published: 9:00am, 30 Mar 2022Updated: 2:07pm, 30 Mar 2022

Hong Kong landlords are slashing rents to attract and retain good tenants, especially in areas where a flurry of new homes will be delivered in the first half of this year, as the city’s unemployment rate rises because of the coronavirus pandemic.

Tenants should hunt for bargain rents in areas such as New Territories West, Tseung Kwan O and Kai Tak, where rents were expected to drop further and the landlords were desperate, industry insiders said. As far as lived-in homes elsewhere in the city were concerned, landlords might cut rents for tenants they believe to have good backgrounds or jobs.

Some owners might proactively offer their units at cutthroat prices to speed up leasing, said Chris Wong, executive director at Century 21 Sunrise Property Agency. “There will be a large supply of new homes. If they leave the properties vacant, apart from the rent forgone, they will also need to pay high management fees,” Wong said.

About 8,750 homes are expected to be delivered in the first half of 2022, in new developments across Hong Kong, according to an estimate by Midland Realty. Some may be delayed because of slower progress in construction and Covid-19 driven delays in deliveries of materials.

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Hong Kong’s growing homeless community is feeling the pains of the pandemic

But this surge in supply could coincide with a rise in unemployment. For instance, Financial Secretary Paul Chan Mo-po on Sunday said that Hong Kong’s unemployment rate for the three months ending in February had risen to 4.5 per cent, its highest level in nearly five months.

Projects that are expected to hand over keys to owners in April include The Henley in Kai Tak, which has 883 flats in two phases, and the 503-flat Ocean Marini in Lohas Park. Tuen Mun and nearby Sham Tseng districts will have the most number of new flats at 2,299 units, while Tin Shui Wai district will account for about 1,612 units and Tseung Kwan O district will account for about 1,510 units. The Kai Tak, Ho Man Tin and Hung Hom districts in Kowloon will have a total of about 1,123 new flats.

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