Singapore is Japan’s top property investor in 2023
SINGAPORE became the biggest investor in Japan’s real estate sector this year, lured by the yen’s weakness and growing demand in logistics and hospitality industries, according to Knight Frank.
Inflows from the city-state totalled almost US$3 billion so far in 2023, followed by investors from the US, Canada, and the United Arab Emirates, according to a report published this month.
Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund GIC’s purchase of six warehouses in Japan from Blackstone for US$800 million contributed significantly to that, said Christine Li, Knight Frank’s head of Asia-Pacific research, in the report.
GIC chief investment officer Jeffrey Jaensubhakij recently described Japan as a “very cheap” market where value can be realised, and with a long way to run.
International investors are also attracted to the country’s low borrowing costs, and are putting more money into hotels because of a post-pandemic tourism boom.
Foreign investors, including Goldman Sachs, KKR and Blackstone, have spent a combined US$2 billion on hotel deals in Japan so far in 2023, the most compared with any other sector in Asian commercial property, according to MSCI Real Assets.
Japan’s surge in hybrid work arrangements and rising supply has eroded investors’ appetite for the office sector, Knight Frank said in the report.
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