_Looking ahead: Singapore's real estate market in 2018

Singapore government’s series of cooling measures, introduced between 2012 to 2013, resulted in the local residential market trading into negative territory for few years. Four years on, we finally see the property market bottoming out in Q3 of 2017 and witnessed a pick-up in transaction activities, particularly in the residential sector.

Developers began to sense the market bottoming out and had been very active in residential en bloc sales; picking up almost 20 projects since May 2017. Transaction volume of residential land sales within the year — over $9.4 billion to-date — charts a new 10-year high and serves as a testament to both local and overseas developers’ confidence in the

Singapore property market. We foresee this momentum continuing into 2018. As aged developments make way for redevelopment, we anticipate a new benchmark in residential property prices from late 2018 onwards, due to higher land costs from the recent en bloc sales.

On the macro economic front, Singapore’s GDP forecast is trending positively. With better economic prospect, we can expect a positive spillover effect leading to an increase in occupancy and rental rates for the industrial and office sector.

Meanwhile, innovative technological platforms are emerging at a rapid pace and will disrupt the way real estate businesses are being done.