Ho Chi Minh City boasted improved residential sales following the traditionally slow Ghost Month
According to CBRE’s latest report, as sales improve and buyers’ confidence increases, developers have become more and more confident launching their products.
Well-attended launches continued to enjoy high sales results in the third quarter, although the number of new launches went down 8.8 per cent due to Ghost Month (from July to August).
CBRE noted that with 3,104 units launched, supply in the third quarter went up 95.8 per cent compared to the same period last year.
Thanks to improving market conditions, prices on both the primary and secondary markets in the third quarter started to show tentative improvement against the second. Primary prices increased from 1 to 4 per cent compared to the last quarter and 1.2 to 5.4 per cent compared to the same period last year across all segments.
The most noticeable improvement was in District 2, thanks to infrastructure improvements such as Metroline No.1.
On another note, the increase in tenants looking for buy-to-let options bolstered high-end apartment prices.
However, in general the high-end segment showed a more positive picture than the other segments as resellers easily found tenants confident in capital gains.
According to Duong Thuy Dung, head of CBRE’s Research and Consulting Department, sales volumes continued to rise with deposits put down on 50-70 per cent of units. Preliminary figures showed that sales volume increased by 8.6 per cent on-quarter and 94.8 per cent on-year to approximately 3,300 units sold.
While the affordable segment continued to rise, the number of units sold in the high-end segment as a whole was relatively modest.
Buyers at high-end developments comprised a high proportion of either buy-to-let or capital gain investors that are often superstitious about selling or buying houses during Ghost Month. In contrast, end-users, and especially those on a limited budget, buy a house at whatever point they are able to access financing.
“It has been a long seven year slog with disappointments and broken promises on house delivery. However, recent positive sales results and busy launch events suggest that we have may arrived at a point where the worst of the market is behind us,” Dung added.
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