Singapore condo rents up 0.5% in January; HDB rents drop 0.2%: SRX

RENTS for condominiums and private apartments reversed course last month to notch a small increase while HDB rents slipped for a third consecutive month, according to the latest flash estimates from real estate portal SRX on Wednesday.

Its overall price index for non-landed private residential rentals for January increased by 0.5 per cent month on month. SRX also revised December's dip in rents to 0.2 per cent, from its initial estimate of a 0.3 per cent decline.

Rents in the core central region (CCR) decreased by 1.3 per cent, but those in the rest of central region (RCR) and outside central region (OCR) increased by 2.7 per cent and 0.2 per cent respectively.

Year-on-year, private rents last month were down by 0.9 per cent from January 2017. In individual sectors, CCR and OCR posted a one per cent and 2.2 per cent decrease respectively, while those in RCR posted a 0.6 per cent increase.

Compared with the January peak in 2013, rent in the past month were down 19.6 per cent.

However, SRX noted that rental volumes increased by 21.7 per cent in January with an estimated 4,198 condo and apartment units leased, compared with 3,449 units in December.

Year-on-year, rental volume in January was 4.3 per cent higher than the 4,023 units signed for in January 2017.

In contrast with the private rental market, Housing Development Board (HDB) flat rents in January slipped 0.2 per cent from December despite a 0.2 per cent increase in HDB 4 Room rentals.

According to SRX ,rents for 5-room flats and executiveflats dipped by 0.1 per cent and 2.4 per cent respectively, while rents for 3-room flats remained unchanged.

Year-on-year, rents last month were down by 3 per cent from January 2017.

Meanwhile, rents in mature estates decreased by 0.6 per cent month on month, while those in non-mature estates increased by 0.3 per cent.

Year-on-year, rents of mature estates in January 2018 slipped 2.7 per cent and rents of non-mature estates fell 3.3 per cent from January 2017.

More HDB flats were rented out in January with leasings up by 15.3 per cent to an estimated 1,800 units outfrom 1,561 the month before, SRX said.

Year-on-year, rental volume in January increased by 16.7 per cent.