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進入《TAIPEI TIMES》 Housing transactions hold steady
Commercial and residential buildings are pictured in New Taipei City’s Jhonghe District yesterday. Evertrust Rehouse Co’s latest housing market report showed that New Taipei City still has a large number of vacant homes, along with Taoyuan, Hsinchu and Kaohsiung. Photo: CNA
RECOVERY: The percentage of people with pessimistic views about housing prices fell as the nation got its virus outbreak under control, Evertrust Rehouse said
By Crystal Hsu / Staff reporter
Housing transactions held resilient in the first half of this year, while storefront sales tumbled 50 percent, as more people shop online amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Evertrust Rehouse Co （永慶房屋） said yesterday.
The number of housing deals might total 142,000 to 146,000 in the first six months, which would range from a 1 percent decline to a 2 percent increase from the same period last year, Evertrust general manager Yeh Ling-chi （葉凌棋） told a news conference.
The projection came after transactions in the first five months totaled 117,337 nationwide, a mild 2.2 percent dip from a year earlier due to the outbreak, Yeh said.
Confidence picked up this quarter and might continue to improve, according to the broker’s quarterly sentiment survey.
People with pessimistic views about housing prices fell to 35 percent, down from 55 percent three months earlier, while another 35 percent expected steady prices, the survey found.
The sentiment recovery has much to do with Taiwan’s successful control of the virus outbreak, allowing 46 percent to believe it is wise to buy houses in the coming six months, Evertrust Rehouse spokesman Jay Hsieh （謝志傑） said.
Others believe it is better to postpone purchase decisions until next year or 2022 given that confirmed COVID-19 cases remain on the rise in many parts of the world, warranting caution, Hsieh said.
Nearly 60 percent of the respondents said the pandemic weakened their interest in buying houses because their income might be affected, it said.
A majority of respondents, or 51 percent, said they would go ahead with plans to sell houses and are willing to lower profit expectations to facilitate deals, it said.
While housing transactions might soon emerge from the virus crisis, storefronts are losing popularity, as people grow increasingly used to online shopping.
Seventy-five percent of respondents said they avoided eating out during the outbreak and most intend to do the same in the post-pandemic era, Hsieh said.
That change in consumer behavior helped explain why storefront deals plunged 52 percent in the first four months, while the number of storefronts for sale rose 13.2 percent and the number of storefronts for rent soared 41.9 percent, Yeh said.
Storefront rents have fallen about 25 percent in the past few years in Taipei and Hsinchu, and 10 percent in Kaohsiung and Tainan, Yeh said.
High vacancy rates suggest continued rent correction pressure, the broker said.
新聞來源：TAIPEI TIMES
