Singapore high-end apartments a magnet for Chinese buyers

Rising demand for luxury apartments comes as property prices -- and sales -- rebound. Buoyant sales, if they continue, may go some way to clearing Singapore’s property glut.

Singapore’s luxury apartments are proving a magnet for Chinese buyers with purchases of properties north of S$5 million ($3.7 million) almost doubling in the third quarter.

The number of private homes in Singapore sold to Chinese buyers rose to 40 under a time period of three months (File photo)

The number of private homes sold to Chinese buyers rose to 40 in the three months ended Sept. 30, up from 21 the same period of 2018, data compiled by Cushman & Wakefield Plc show.

But cooling measures that were levied in July 2018 and which made units more expensive for foreigners have resulted in a slide in purchases of apartments under the S$5 million mark. Sales of units priced between S$3 million and S$5 million -- considered mid-tier in Singapore, which frequently ranks as one of the world’s most expensive places to live -- dropped 63%.

“This could be due to the fact that there were other cheaper alternatives that also appeal to the Chinese, such as Malaysia, where the threshold for foreign buyers has been lowered to 600,000 ringgit ($145,000) or Thailand, which is also a popular holiday destination for mainlanders,” Christine Li, head of research for Singapore and South-East Asia at Cushman & Wakefield, said.

Buoyant sales, if they continue, may go some way to clearing Singapore’s property glut. There are almost 32,000 apartments --some finished, others under construction and still more in the planning phase --in the pipeline.