Wednesday, August 19, 2009

Frenzy in private property market

There is a frenzy in the private property market. People are rushing for the new launches at record prices.

I plan to introduce a website that gives information to the consumers about the prices of private property and condominiums. Buyers can search the website to see what is being transacted for similar properties around the same area. They can also see the amenities and other useful information.

The website is not ready yet, but you can get a feel about the information that is available by looking at the development version in www.easysearch.sg (Real Estate Data). It will be ready by end August (with past transactions and amenity data).

Consumers should carry out their research and understand the market, before committing to a purchase of $1 million or more, that will tie them down over a lifetime.

Tan Kin Lian

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Mr TKL
Thank you for this property website. I am joining the rush to take up a new property launch. I find this website to be useful in giving me information about prices in nearby condos, which are 30% lower than new launch. This makes me more realistic.

Can your property agency help me to buy a more reaaonable price property? Are there any listing of property for sale? Can I get a property at the benchmark price (BMP)? Why are the amenities (AMX) blank now?

Tan Kin Lian said...

Reply to 8:11 AM

The AMX will be ready in about 2 weeks' time.

We aim to build up the listing over the next two months. Meanwhile, I hope that you find the benchmark price and actual transactions to be useful.

You got the right strategy to look at the price of comparable projects (in the same sector, same type). This gives you an idea about what is the reasonable market price for a new property, which can be 10%to 20% higher (but don't pay more).

Anonymous said...

TKL,

Thanks for sharing. A wonderful project from you again. It gives us real buyer a proper guide unlike property agents & developers who are out to make a killing. Hopefully people will go in with their EYES open.

PS: The developers and agents may boycott your site though.

cheers and have a good day ahead.

Tan Kin Lian said...

I hope that this website gets popular with the general public. The developers will find this website to be an attractive place to put their advertisements of new launches.

If they price the properties at the right price, they will get good response from informed investors. The good response will allow them to raise their prices anyway.

So, it may be a win-win solution. Transparency will breed trust and demand.

Someone applied for a Profile report. It will only be ready in one month's time. Sorry. The program is being changed to indicate this delay.

Tan Kin Lian said...

My friend had trouble in selling his HDB flat. He asked if it is possible to list his flat in this website.

I plan to make it available in two month's time to list HDB flats. I have to decide on the grouping into "projects" or "neighbourhoods". Someone suggested that all blocks in the same street should be treated as a "project". I think that this may be a good approach.

Anonymous said...

Great site on property. looking forward for it. but still waiting a slump of price first

Robert Tan said...

Ideally, in assessing whether the price of a property reasonable, one should assess what is the long term sustainable rental yield of that property. If the calculated yield is too low, then one may be paying too much for the property. Another way of looking at it, you may be better off renting. (or it may be indicative that in the mid to longer term, the price of the property is more lokely to drop)

Unfortunately, this is easier said than done because property are not always purely an investment - often, people are caught up by their emotions or the sentiment at that time.

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