Industrial Sales Hit 18-Month Low in October and More Hong Kong Real Estate Headlines

Leading today’s Hong Kong real estate news, the city’s once robust industrial market has become the latest casualty of the property market downturn as the volume of warehouses and workshops traded in October sank to an 18-month low. Asset owners in other sectors also seem to be getting chilling messages as a home owner cut the price of his Tai Kok Tsui flat by 20 percent to move the unit and a Kwun Tong commercial building cut its asking rents for newly redeveloped office space by 22 percent. Read on for all these stories and more in the world’s most expensive real estate market.

Industrial Sales Hit 18-Month Low in October

Sales of industrial buildings fell to 284 transactions in last month, following the overall market downhill. The transaction quantity for October represented the lowest monthly total of industrial deals in the past year and a half.

Despite the October slowdown, however, the total value of industrial property sold in Hong Kong during the first ten months of this year already has surpassed all of last year, adding up to HK$38.4 billion in ten months, up four percent compared to the HK$36.9 billion total for all of 2017. Read more>>

Home Owner Cuts Price by 20% to Sell Kowloon Flat

The owner of a residential flat in Kowloon’s Tai Kok Tsui district cut HK$1.42 million (US$181,307) from the price of a 332 square foot (31 square metre) home, reducing the price by 20 percent to HK$5.88 million as the Hong Kong housing market slows.

The unidentified seller dropped the price of the home in the Park Summit development after marketing it unsuccessfully since August of this year. The motivated seller had originally purchased the home in the project jointly developed by Sino Land and the Urban Renewal Authority, for HK$5.01 million around three years ago, thus earning about 17 percent from the deal. Read more>>

Industrial Conversion in Kwun Tong Lowers Rents

The owner of the Kwok Kee Group Centre in Kwun Tong, which just reopened in September after being converted from industrial to commercial use, has cut its asking rents for office space from HK$22 per square foot to HK$17 per square foot to entice tenants amid the market slowdown.

The commercial building comprises five floors of office space marketed in 8,000 square foot (743 square metre) units, and five floors of retail, with the ground level shops carrying asking rents of HK$90 per square foot, according to a representative of Midland Realty, which is representing the owner. Read more>>

Son of Henry Fok Sells Mid-Levels West Flat for HK$51M

Fok Man-sun, son of the late billionaire and mainland political liaison Henry Fok, sold a 1,297 square foot (120 square metre) flat in Mid-Levels West for HK$51 million (US$6.5 million) last month after holding it for about five years, according to the Land Registry.

The disposal of the flat, located in Swire Properties’ Azura residential tower on Seymour Road, worked out to an average price of HK$39,322 per square foot, earning the seller about 12.5 percent compared to the HK$453 million he paid to purchase the home in 2013. Read more>>

Li Family’s Mid-Levels Home Valued at HK$2.2 billion

A stand-alone house in Hong Kong’s mid-levels that is the traditional home of one of the city’s most powerful clans has seen its value rise to HK$2.2 billion following completion of a four-year renovation project, according to family member Paul Li Man-hong.

The 28-storey Kennedy Terrace home of the Li Shek Men family, whose members include former Hong Kong chief justice Andrew Li, chairman of the council of the University of Hong Kong Arthur Li, and chairman of the Bank of East Asia David Li, has been standing on the site since 1927. Originally only four storeys tall, the dwelling now covers a total saleable area of 36,700 square feet (3,410 square metres), worth an estimated HK$60,000 per square foot, Li said. Read more>>

URA to Redevelop Tai Kok Tsui Buildings

The Hong Kong government on Friday approved a proposal submitted by the Urban Renewal Authority to redevelop several buildings on Oak and Ivy streets in Kowloon’s Tai Kok Tsui area.

The project would yield 4,987 square metres of residential space and 998 square metres of commercial in the lower floors, on the same site which currently provides 820 square metres across the group of 41 to 55-year-old buildings. Read more>>

Mainland Buyer Pays HK$32.8M Tax for Two Kai Tak Homes

Non-resident homebuyers in Hong Kong pay 30 percent stamp duty but mainland newcomers to the city still seem eager to boost local tax revenues.

Huang Xumin, chairman of a mainland food manufacturer, recently purchased a pair of Kai Tak homes for HK$109 million from developer K Wah International Holdings, and found himself kicking in another HK$32.8 million in stamp duty for the two apartments on Muk Ning Street. Read more>>

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