S'pore ranked outside top 5 for real estate prospects

Japan and Australia remain the favourite countries for real estate development and investment, according to the Emerging Trends in Real Estate Asia Pacific 2016 forecast jointly published by the Urban Land Institute (ULI) and PwC.

Tokyo, Sydney, Melbourne and Osaka took four of the top five spots for promising markets in the Asia Pacific. Ho Chi Minh City was rated fifth.

The study, which surveyed 343 real estate professionals, ranked Singapore eleventh for investment prospects and ninth for development out of 22 regional markets.

Specifically, it pointed to a slow residential market here, mainly due to government actions in 2013 to stem soaring home prices.

"Given the current sentiments of Singapore's property market, we're seeing local players becoming more involved at a regional and global level as they explore, increase and diversify investments into other major markets such as Japan and Australia," said Yeow Chee Keong, Real Estate & Hospitality Leader, PwC Singapore.

He added: "The residential market will continue to hope for an increase in the level of transactions, and that will be dependent on whether there will be modifications made to the cooling measures."

Despite the tepid enthusiasm, the Emerging Trends report noted that "Singapore is always a market where institutions are looking to buy," adding that a number of major property purchases are expected to be completed before the end of 2015.

Romesh Navaratnarajah, Senior Editor at PropertyGuru, wrote this story. To contact him about this or other stories email romesh@propertyguru.com.sg

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