HK developers offering big perks in rush to clear stock

HONG KONG: Developers here are offering perks such as free rail tickets and early move-in dates in a further sign one of the world’s hottest property markets may finally be cooling.

In a bid to shift apartments, CK Asset Holdings Ltd is giving away high-speed rail holiday and travel packages, including accommodation, worth HK$280,000 (RM147,155) for people who agree to purchase one of its four-bedroom units at a development in Hong Kong’s west.

At Kerry Properties Ltd’s Mantin Heights project in Kowloon, buyer can move in after paying only a 10 per cent deposit, and for the first two years, buyers just have to pay government rates and management fees.

Incentives are being laid on thick as firms rush to sell stock ahead of a vacancy tax that will penalise developers for holding onto empty apartments. Various government cooling measures announced in June, along with rising interest rates, have prompted some market watchers to predict Hong Kong’s 15-year run-up in home prices may be coming to an end.

Some developers are selling apartments at quite steep discounts, while others aren’t providing mortgages at all due to the concern that rising borrowing costs may increase defaults.

Sun Hung Kai Properties Ltd has gone the other way, offering to loan 100 per cent of a unit’s price to buyers of its Park YOHO Napoli project in the New Territories. That financing plan is only available for those purchasing apartments of more than HK$7 million, and does include a few additional conditions, like pledging other property as collateral.

Real estate companies are also boosting property agents’ commissions in order to accelerate sales.