Chart of the Day: Speculative buyers kicked out of Singapore's property market

Sub-sales are now a thing of the past.

Eight rounds of cooling measures have done a good job of curbing speculative property buying in Singapore, according to this chart from Credit Suisse.

Speculative activity has fallen drastically since their peak in early 2010, when over 300 sub-sales were recorded per month and sub-sale transactions made up over 10% of total sales.

Now, less than 50 sub-sales are recorded per month, and make up a mere 2-4% of total sales volumes.

Credit Suisse believes that this trend, coupled with a drop in foreign demand and an improvement in housing affordability, should push the government to ease some measures next year.

"Against a backdrop of a rising interest rate environment, a weakening labour market and an oversupply situation that is expected to persist in the next few years, we think a preemptive re-calibration of measures rather than ex-post corrective actions would be a better way to go in achieving a stable and sustainable property market. This is especially so given the context of a home ownership rate of 90%, with residential property representing a dominant majority at 46% of household assets; we believe that a large correction in
property prices is neither desirable and/or tolerated," said the report.