Could redevelopment deals spur recovery in housing market?

Four deals have already been struck this year.

Bloomberg Markets reported that after slowing to a trickle the past three years as housing prices fell, four redevelopment deals -- where a group of owners band together to sell entire apartment blocks at a hefty premium -- have been struck already this year, with a combined value of $1.5b (US$1.1b). The process, also known as “en-bloc” sales, allows developers to knock down and rebuild in a city where new residential land sales are tightly controlled by the government.

The renewed hunger for land comes as home sales climb after some property restrictions were eased in March. A residential plot last month fetched a record price in a government land sale, with a Chinese consortium bidding $1b. In the biggest en-bloc sale this year, Eunosville, a complex of 10 residential blocks with 330 apartments, sold to Hongkong Land Holdings Ltd.’s MCL Land for $765.8m

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