Uncompleted home listings surged 45% to 3,628 units in Q3

62.7% or 2,275 units were from 12 newly launched projects.

The number of uncompleted private residential units that were put up for sale have jumped 45% QoQ to 3,628 units in Q3, according to Savills report. More than half of this figure (62.7% or 2,275 units) were from 12 newly launched projects, whilst the remaining 37.3% or 1,353 units were released in the previous quarters.

In line with this, new home sales also climbed 39.6% QoQ to 3,281 units of private homes being sold in the same quarter, compared to 2,350 units sold in Q2. This is also said to be the highest quarterly number since Q2 2013.

By market segment, new sales in the Core Central Region (CCR), Rest of Central Region (RCR) and Outside Central Region (OCR) rose 3.5% QoQ, 32.7% QoQ and 53.5% QoQ, respectively. The best-selling ones were the 1,468-unit Parc Clematis (sold 665 units), 1,074-unit Avenue South Residence (sold 500 units) and the 774-unit One Pearl Bank (sold 280 units). These three projects have take-up rates ranging from 29.6% to 33.6%, which are “relatively healthy”.

Notably, their tally of 1,445 sold units have outpaced the 1,417 units from 16 newly launched projects in Q2.

“Despite the quarter being afflicted by a sluggish economy and the Hungry Ghost month, during which it is considered inauspicious for people to buy houses or developers to launch, the primary sales market performed better than expected in the third quarter of 2019,” Savills stated in the report.

Savills noted that the best-selling units in the primary market during 9M 2019 were priced between $1m to $1.25m each. This was followed by the price per unit ranges from $1.25 to $1.5m and from $750,000 to $1m. These accounts 19.2% and 18.6% of the total new sales, respectively.

Furthermore, the popular price range corresponded with smaller unit sizes. The report stated that of all new units sold in 9M, 34.8% had a unit size from 600 to 800 sqft whilst 27.6% were from 400 to 600 sqft.

Meanwhile, sales in the secondary market also picked up, albeit at a slower rate of 2.7% QoQ to 2,482 units sold in Q3 due to spill-over effects from the active primary sales market. By locality, both the RCR and OCR posted an increase of 3.3% QoQ, whilst the CCR saw a marginal growth of 0.8% QoQ.