Tag: Investing in real estate

An idea to explore if you’re renting (Part II)

Posted on by Centauri78

By Centauri78

If there’s part I, there must at least be a part II, right? Of course!! If you’ve been waiting for this sequel, sorry I’ve kept you waiting for so long. I hope I pack enough of a punch here to be worth your waiting time!

So anyway, some of you out there may be thinking that you’re nice and comfortable living in your rental place and moving’s such a hassle. However, property ownership still sounds like a good option to hedge against rising rentals. Well, certainly, you can do both! However, there are a few options, and correspondingly, there are a couple of questions you have to ask. Continue reading “An idea to explore if you’re renting (Part II)” →

What is really happening in the Singapore property market, as told by the Heat Map

Posted on by Centauri78

Over the last 4 weeks since we restarted The Straits Times Property News Heat Map, news flow has actually been pretty slow. With 53 articles talking about the property market in 4 weeks, that’s an average of 13.25 articles per week or 1.89 articles per day. In Season 1 (9 Sep 12 – 19 Jan 13), there were 273 articles in 19 weeks, or 14.37 articles per week, or 2.05 articles per day on average.

 Week of  Negative  Neutral  Positive  Total
13/5/13  1  6 3 10
20/5/13  2 6  3 11
27/5/13  2  13  5 20
3/6/13  2 8 2 12

The proportion of articles that were positive, neutral or negative is also instructive. We had 7 negative (13%), 33 neutral (62%) and 13 positive (25%) articles in the last 4 weeks. In Season 1, we had 10% negative, 49% neutral and 40% positive. Continue reading “What is really happening in the Singapore property market, as told by the Heat Map” →

After the Cooling Measures and White Paper: Is Property Still Viable?

Posted on by Centauri78

Now that the new cooling measures and the White Paper on population has had time to sink in, it’s time to figure out what the effects are, and how they will impact the property buying/selling decision.

Continue reading “After the Cooling Measures and White Paper: Is Property Still Viable?” →

The Myth of Hot Money

Posted on by Centauri78

Something’s been bothering me. I keep hearing people blaming rising housing prices on truckloads of hot money coming into Singapore and blowing bubbles into the property market, and how the property market will subsequently implode when the funds inevitably leave.
Continue reading “The Myth of Hot Money” →

Poll Results

Posted on by Centauri78

We asked you, our readers, to vote on where you think the property market will be at the end of 2015 relative to beginning 2012. Thanks to all those who voted! Here are the results!

An overwhelming majority (80%) voted either down or up by less than 10%, with slightly more voting on the downside. To be honest, I had expected a higher number of people voting the extreme cases, but I guess our readers are a little more conservative with their opinions. In any case, let’s have a thought about what to do in each scenario.
Continue reading “Poll Results” →

TODAY article: Rentals go up near international schools

Posted on by Centauri78

Found this article from TODAY newspaper interesting. In the short article, it brings up a few points.

International school students have increased by 25% over the last 4 years. Picture courtesy of Singaporebaby.com

Point 1: Number of international students has increased 25% over the last 4 years.

Significance: Increase in international students = increase in expat families. Singapore remains an attractive location for companies. Additionally, the expats coming over should be relatively high-level for the companies to relocate the entire family. Since companies are unlikely to purchase real estate simply to house their expats, this should continue provide support for the rental market.
Continue reading “TODAY article: Rentals go up near international schools” →

Looking into my crystal ball…

Posted on by Centauri78

Where will property prices be in the next few years? Will property prices plunge 30 – 50% as per the doomsday prophets? Will property prices trundle along sideways, moving up and down within a 10% band? Or will property prices continue its steady climb upwards? Unfortunately, I don’t know, so I can’t tell you. If I knew for sure, I wouldn’t tell you either. So, since I don’t know for sure, I will lay down how I think the different scenarios may play out so you can make your own educated guess. But before we go into the heavy stuff, let’s have some fun with a poll!

Continue reading “Looking into my crystal ball…” →

Property Market Update

Posted on by Centauri78

According to the NUS SRPI, the property market continued to stabilise in June, with no change in the overall index. Breaking the index into its components, the market is supported by transactions in the non-central region with a month-on-month increase of 0.7% while the central region and small units decreased by 0.9% and 1.4% respectively.

NUS SRPI for June 2012

Continue reading “Property Market Update” →

Is the Singapore Property Market in Trouble? Part 3

Posted on by Centauri78

Since the best trilogies come in threes, I guess this will be the final one of the series. In part 1, I talked about the risk of additional cooling measures. In part 2, I discussed the risk of over-leverage and increase in interest rates. In this part I shall talk about the risk of over-supply in the market.

Risk 4: Risk of over-supply

Another reason why the property market may come down is over-supply of properties, or to be more specific, more supply of properties than demand. Economics 101 tells us that price is determined by the interaction of demand and supply. When there is more demand than supply, prices go up. Conversely, if supply exceeds demand, prices come down. In order to determine the risk of over-supply, we need to split it up into the different categories of housing. Continue reading “Is the Singapore Property Market in Trouble? Part 3” →