Singapore developers’ group attacks latest government measures to cool state’s property prices
DBS analysts warns the curbs could potentially see the buoyant ‘en-bloc’ market, where groups of owners band together to sell a collection of flats, ‘grinding to a halt’
A leading developers’ group in Singapore has challenged the government’s latest round of property-cooling measures, saying that there’s no rationale for the planned steps as the market is only in the early stages of a recovery, The Straits Times has reported.
Singapore’s renewed clampdown on speculative property demand sent real estate stocks reeling at the end of last week, as analysts predicted the end of a nascent home price rebound and the deflation of a buoyant market for collective sales.
Singapore’s market started to pick up only last year, and the volume of transactions is within expectations, the Real Estate Developers Association of Singapore said in the statement, according to the report.
But the group has described the measures as tough, and said the market should be allowed time to find its own course without official intervention.
The Singapore government has a history of stepping into the property market to restrain demand and prices, and announced its latest measures late on Thursday before they came into effect hours later.