Outlook for secondary market worsens amid property cooling measures

January - February transactions down to 800 units.

According to Nomura, it appears the cooling measures are having a bigger impact on the secondary market. Based on caveats lodged so far, theaverage monthly secondary transactions during the first two months of  2013 came to 800 units, vs c.1,400 units in 2012, c.1,600 units in 2011, and c.2,000 units in 2010. 

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Where there were secondary transactions, however, it appears prices have remained firm despite the new measures, at least among the
projects that we track, on an apple-to-apple comparison. 

Still, the bid-offer spreads between prospective buyers and sellers appear to have remained wide, based on secondary listings for similar units this month).

As developers push out more new launches (thereby offering more choices to buyers on one hand and pricing benchmarks for sellers on the other), it seems likely that the bid-offer spreads in the secondary market will continue to be wide, which should imply relatively low transaction volume.