Hong Kong government an ‘accomplice’ in skyrocketing home prices, says JLL
Hong Kong government’s property cooling measures have frozen transactions in the secondary market and distorted overall housing supply, says a major property consultant.
Joseph Tsang, managing director at JLL accused the government of being an “accomplice in Hong Kong’s skyrocketing home prices”, as sales in the secondary market had been killed by administrative measures.
“Due to a sharp fall of flats being put on sale in the secondary market, home seekers are flocking to the primary market to jostle for new flats. Prices are being driven up by larger demand,” he said.
Since the government rolled out a slew of cooling measures in 2012, the number of total transactions had tumbled by half to 73,004 last year. Of the total, deals in the secondary residential market had plunged 46 per cent to 40,466 in 2016 from 2012.
In contrast, the number of transactions in the primary market had jumped 15 per cent during the same corresponding period.
