Property

Hong Kong’s property investment volume is expected to rise by up to 15 per cent this year from a 10-year low, as investors cautiously hunt bargains after significant price corrections amid rising interest rates, analysts said.

With unsold stock of between 16,000 and 18,000 units, and new supply in the pipeline, about 45,000 new flats are likely to become available this year, says CBRE, roughly four times the number that sold in 2022.

Many mainland cities including Changsha and Nanjing have come with generous policies to help skilled immigrants buy new homes and spur economic growth.

The PBOC will channel 80 billion yuan (US$11.8 billion) of loans to high-quality developers through the nation’s biggest bad-debt asset managers, with a similar amount to be matched by the distressed debt firms, according to sources.

The reopening of Hong Kong’s borders with mainland China and the rest of the world is likely to boost the take up of office space in the city, but rents are not expected to rise significantly, analysts said.

A unit of Chinese conglomerate Dalian Wanda Group has issued an 11 per cent US$400 million bond, reversing market expectations about junk debt following a default crisis among indebted Chinese developers.

Deal ends more than two years of legal wrangling over the 28-storey Goldin Financial Global Centre, while the price agreed on by PAG and Singapore’s Mapletree Investments is well below market value, PAG said.

Transactions in the 11-city megalopolis will surge, especially in the second half of the year, and return nearly to pre-pandemic levels, according to Cushman & Wakefield. Meanwhile, the GBA accounts for a growing share of China’s commercial real estate investment.

The biggest residential plot of land in Hong Kong’s southern Stanley district in two decades was withdrawn from sale by the government on Tuesday, after all four tenders failed to meet its reserve price.

China has begun the new year by extending its policy of easing mortgage rates and pledging ‘strong support’ for first home purchases with the aim of turning the tide for its ailing property market.

Chinese builders defaulted on a record amount of dollar bonds last year, fallout from a property-sector crackdown that left many builders with shrinking cash and fuelled more than a year of falling home sales.

Sunac is buying an additional 3.5 years to repay local bondholders, a reprieve that may allow the developer to see out the current industry slump as Beijing turns more supportive of the players.

The rally late last year came after the stock market regulator lifted a six-year ban on refinancing, and commercial banks ramped up lending to ease the industry-wide liquidity crunch.