‘Hope’ in a subdued (property) market?

A good title to an article usually attracts readers to read. There’s one in NST with the title of: Henry Butcher Malaysia Study: ‘There’s still hope in subdued market’ It offers views from a famous real estate company about the state of the property market of Malaysia. I would say that the article is considered positive. For example, it shared that even though the property market is soft bu the corporate earnings for developers have been decent in first half of 2017. (Yes, we have been having a slow property market for some time, why do developers still report decent earnings… do you wonder? Transactions are still moving actually, contrary to beliefs that the whole market has stopped. In fact it is hundreds of thousands of units of residential properties still. 🙂  Total transactions including commercial units are still over 300,000 in 2016. Hope this explains why the richer will become richer and why I seriously hope first-timers would buy instead of wasting their money on some new phones every year.
 
Henry Butcher’s study also showed that there are more new launches in H1 2017 compared to the same period last year. (This can reasonably point to the fact that perhaps there are now more units being launched since the prices are now lower. Or, perhaps confidence is really coming back? Based on my friends’ feedbacks, not really yet. Haha.) What are being launched? Mostly condominiums and serviced apartments.  (If you are just buying to stay, get whichever is cheaper for more. Size matters, basically.) Henry Butcher shared that the most popular sizes are between 1,001 and 1,200 sq ft. (This would also be my preferred size if we are talking about prices which are still affordable. As everyone noted, a lot of the affordable projects are 800 sq ft or higher but usually lower than 1,000 sq ft. For an in-depth coverage, do refer to the article here. Pretty comprehensive. 🙂
I hope no one is hoping for property prices to fall back to the levels of before 2009. If it happens, I do not think anyone has a job that pays them enough money to buy. The market will continue to adapt to focus on affordability and ácceptability’. Affordability simply meant buyers have to accept smaller sizes for more well known areas. Acceptability (my own term) is the willingness to look at WHY instead of just the usual WHERE. The fact remains that there are already areas which most buyers would never afford no matter how long they save unless their pay is the top 10% in Malaysia they could really save a lot. (My ex-colleague told me that she could save 70% of her pay…. My wife, when she was staying with her parents could save almost the same. Haha. )  MRT has helped? Actually, LRT has been around for years but somehow, not many would think staying 10 minutes away from a LRT line is okay. Well, at least now MRT has become sort of a catalyst… or perhaps the property prices are the real çatalysts? Either way, property remains an essential buy, in my opinion. Cheers.
written on 13 Sept 2017
Next suggested article: Earning higher is great. Saving it to earn more is vital