Developers' sales in 4Q12 below the robust buying average

Sales dropped by hefty 27.6%.

According to Colliers International, sales in 4Q 2012 slowed down from the robust buying averaging 5,948 units per quarter seen from January to September 2012.

Developer sales in the three months ending December 2012 fell 27.6% QoQ to 4,283 units from 5,916 units sold in 3Q 2012.

As has been the case since 3Q 2010, mass- market projects located in the Outside Central Region (OCR) dominated activities in the primary market in 4Q 2012.

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Homes in the OCR contributed to 51.0% and 63.1% of developer launches and sales during this period, respectively, despite falling from their corresponding market shares of 76.3% and 74.8% in 3Q 2012.

Given that developers held back project launches during this year-end lull period, homes released from newly-launched projects in the OCR dropped 54.5% QoQ to 1,755 units in the October to December 2012 quarter.

Only two large-scale projects were launched in the OCR during the quarter, both of which are 99-year leasehold projects to be built on land released by the Government under the Government Land Sales (GLS) programme.