Condo resale volumes in Singapore hit 10-year high; prices up 0.1% in March: SRX

MONTHLY condo resale volumes hit a 10-year high, with 1,662 units resold in March. This is more than double the number in the same period last year, and is 75.3 per cent higher than the five-year average volumes for the month of March.

The month also saw a 0.1 per cent increase in prices, extending the rise for the eighth month in a row.

Year on year (yoy), overall resale prices advanced 4.2 per cent, flash figures from real estate portal SRX Property showed on Tuesday. (see amendment note)

Property analysts from PropNex and OrangeTee & Tie credited this to the lack of new home supply, especially in suburban areas.

Christine Sun, senior vice-president of research and analytics at OrangeTee & Tie, noted that there have been no mega launches in the outside of central region (OCR) this year, turning buyers to the resale market for alternative housing.

The OCR gained 4.6 per cent yoy, but decreased by 0.2 per cent from February. The region's highest transacted price was a unit at Archipelago, resold for S$2.8 million.

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The region also led in volumes, with 60.2 per cent of transactions coming from the OCR. The core central region (CCR) and rest of central region (RCR) made up 23.2 per cent and 16.5 per cent respectively.

"As mega launches in the suburban region will continue to be limited, demand for resale mass-market homes may continue to remain robust this year, barring new cooling measures or unforeseen circumstances," Ms Sun said.

Analysts from Huttons Asia and PropNex suggested that the launch of condos at the CCR such as Midtown Modern had sparked interest in buyers, creating spillover demand to the resale market. Huttons noted that transactions of new CCR homes in March were at their highest in eight years.

Subsequently, the region's resale market saw 1.1 per cent and 3.2 per cent month on month and yoy increases respectively. Its highest sale is for a unit at Keppel Bay's Reflections, sold for S$7 million.

Meanwhile, the RCR gained 4.1 per cent yoy, but dropped 0.1 per cent from the previous month. At S$18.3 million, a unit at Eden topped the market for the highest transacted price in March.

Nicholas Mak, ERA Realty's head of research and consultancy, said: "The roll-out of the vaccination programme has boosted market confidence and has a positive impact on both property prices and sales volume."

SRX's overall median capital gain stood at S$179,500 in March, over S$24,000 lower than that in February. District 21 saw the highest median capital gain at S$380,000, while District 8 posted the lowest at S$114,994.

SRX calculates the capital gain or loss of a condo resale unit by comparing the current transacted price with the same unit's previous transacted price. Capital gain data includes only districts with more than 10 matching transactions.

Amendment note: An earlier version of this article misstated the increase in average sales volume and overall resale price increase.