Reuters is reporting an outcome that gives pause vis-a-vis Australia’s new economic model:
HONG KONG, March 20 (Reuters) – Cash-strapped Chinese are scrambling to sell their luxury homes in Hong Kong, and some are knocking up to a fifth off the price for a quick sale, as a liquidity crunch looms on the mainland.
Wealthy Chinese were blamed for pushing up property prices in the former British territory, where they accounted for 43 percent of new luxury home sales in the third quarter of 2012, before a tax hike on foreign buyers was announced.
The rush to sell coincides with a forecast 10 percent drop in property prices this year as the tax increase and rising borrowing costs cool demand. At the same time, credit conditions in China have tightened.
“Some of the mainland sellers have liquidity issues – say, their companies in China have some difficulties – so they sold the houses to get cash,” said Norton Ng, account manager at a Centaline Property real estate office close to the China border, where luxury houses costing up to HK$30 million ($3.9 million) have been popular with mainland buyers.
In a Hong Kong housing development called Valais, about 10 minutes drive from the Chinese border, real estate agents said that between a quarter and a half of the 330 houses are now on sale. At the development’s frenzied debut in 2010, a third of the HK$30-HK$66 million units were sold on the first day, with nearly half going to mainland China buyers.
Dubbed a “ghost town” by local media, the development built by the city’s largest developer, Sun Hung Kai Properties Ltd , is one of many estates in Hong Kong where agents are seeing an increasing number of Chinese eager to sell.
“Many mainland buyers bought lots of properties in Hong Kong when the market was red-hot three years ago,” said Joseph Tsang, managing director at Jones Lang LaSalle. “But now they want to cash in as liquidity is quite tight in the mainland.”
…”The most important thing for them is to sell as soon as possible,” Centaline’s Chan said. “In the past two weeks, those who were willing to cut prices were mainland Chinese. It is going to have some impact on the local property market, that’s for sure.”
Thank goodness it’s different here.
