Quick takes: Private home prices in Singapore seen easing by 4-6% in 2015

Singapore's private residential prices continued to slide in the second quarter of this year with a 0.9 per cent quarter-on-quarter drop - a seventh straight quarter of decline, the latest government flash estimates show.

This followed a one per cent decline in the first quarter of this year, said the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) on Wednesday.

Here are some comments from market experts:

Chia Siew Chuin, Director of Research & Advisory at Colliers International:

"While this most recent quarterly decrease in 2Q 2015 represents the seventh consecutive quarter of downward price adjustments, the overall private residential price correction from the peak is still fairly moderate at a total of 6.7% over the course of 21 months. As such, the overall easing of prices in the private residential market can be considered very much, a soft landing towards the runway of sustainability, without the turbulence of price volatility."

"While the pace of quarterly price declines is apparent for non-landed private residential properties in all market segments, there are some initial signs that price falls might be tapering off for the Core Central Region (CCR) and Rest of Central Region (RCR)."

"However in the Outside Central Region (OCR), price corrections might get worse before getting better, as prices dropped by 1.2% QoQ compared to the 1.1% QoQ decline in 1Q 2015. This is considering the build-up of private housing inventory and choices, especially in the suburban areas, on the back of the Government's ramped up land sales programme in the last 2-3 years."

"For the rest of 2015, developers will take a restrained stance on new launches as homebuyers are expected to persist with a wait-and-see attitude. There is still substantial supply (from 2015 to beyond 2019) of 19,359 private residential units (as of March 2015) remain unsold from launched projects and unlaunched projects with the prerequisites for sale."

"Given that overall private residential prices have already fallen by 1.9% (based on 2Q 2015 flash estimates) in the first six months of 2015, overall private home prices are likely to soften by about 4% to 6% for the whole of 2015."

ERA:

"In line with expectations, prices continued their descent for the seventh consecutive quarter.''

"Buyers prefer to stick to properties priced below S$1.5 million rather than those on the higher price bands due to the limitations on obtaining financing as well as the impact of having to pay additional buyer's stamp duty.''

"Between the different geographical sectors, it is clear that properties in the OCR suffered the greatest fall in prices. This may be partly due to the large supply of unsold suburban projects competing with buyers in the resale market."

"Prices in the CCR and RCR shows signs of tapering but more time will be needed before it can be said that prices have stabilised.''

"Looking forward, it is projected that prices will generally continue to fall at the current moderate pace, in the absence of any unforeseen events. All in all, we may expect an overall price decline of 5-6% for the whole of 2015.''