Real Estate

Bloomberg Singapore home sales slumped in March and are set to take a harder hit in coming months as the government enforces a more draconian lockdown that threatens to bring the property market to a standstill. Sales in the city-state fell 32% to 660 units last month — even before the toughest curbs were imposed — from 976 in February, ...

Bloomberg Toronto home sales surged in March, though government measures to stem the spread of the Covid-19 virus slowed real-estate activity in the second half of the month. Sales in around Canada’s largest city jumped 12.3% from a year earlier to 8,012 transactions, while the benchmark price climbed 2.3% from February to a non-seasonally adjusted C$865,200 ($611,881), the Toronto Regional ...

Bloomberg UK house prices were climbing at the fastest pace in more than two years before the coronavirus pandemic almost brought the market to a standstill, according to Nationwide Building Society. Values rose 3% from a year earlier in March, and gained 0.8% from February alone, the mortgage lender said. The sample period excludes recent disruption caused by UK’s restrict- ...

Bloomberg Singapore home prices fell the most in more than three years in the first quarter as the coronavirus outbreak slammed the economy. Property values declined 1.2% in the three months ended on March 31, according to a preliminary estimate from the Urban Redevelopment Authority released on Wednesday. That’s the steepest decline since a 1.5% drop in the third quarter ...

Bloomberg Asking prices for UK homes rose to a record in March as the market appeared undented by the coronavirus outbreak that’s threatening economies across the globe. Values increased 1% on the month to an average 312,625 pounds, Rightmove said in a report on Monday. In London, they gained 1.6% from a month earlier to 638,826 pounds. Both gauges posted ...

Bloomberg The world’s biggest property event held on the French Riviera has been pushed back to June over concern about the coronavirus epidemic, the summit organisers said. The four-day event, known as MIPIM, will now take place June 2-5 in Cannes instead of its usual March slot. “The well-being of our clients and staff is our priority,” Paul Zilk, chief ...

Bloomberg If you’re looking to make money at the top of the housing market, head to the tech hubs. Prime properties — broadly defined as the top 5% of residences in a market — in areas like San Francisco, Shenzhen and Berlin have outperformed cities such as New York, Singapore and Paris over the past five years, according to data ...

Bloomberg Sales of previously owned US homes remained robust in January as low borrowing costs and higher wages continue to make purchasing attainable. Contract closings eased 1.3% from the prior month to a 5.46 million annual rate, according to National Association of Realtors data that slightly exceeded the median estimate in Bloomberg’s survey. The median sales price climbed 6.8% from ...

Bloomberg UK real estate agents reported that house prices increased for the first time in more than a year last month. In more evidence of a pickup in sentiment following Boris Johnson’s December election victory, which lifted uncertainty about whether the country would leave the European Union, an index of price changes rose to the strongest level since 2017. Measures ...

Bloomberg Singapore home builders will have one less restriction to worry about after changes to the rules under which some real estate firms operating in the city-state sell apartments. Publicly listed housing developers with a “substantial connection to Singapore” will be allowed an exemption from the Qualifying Certificate regime, according to a statement from the Ministry of Law and Singapore ...