Retail rents slip 0.5% q-o-q in Q4 2017, taking full-year decline to 4.7%: URA

RENTS of retail space fell 0.5 per cent in the fourth quarter of last year over the preceding quarter.

This was a bigger drop compared with the 0.2 per cent quarter-on-quarter decline posted in Q3 2017, the data from the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) showed on Friday morning.

For the whole of last year, retail rents shrank 4.7 per cent - a smaller decline compared with the 8.3 per cent slide in 2016.

URA also said that prices of retail space fell one per cent in the fourth quarter, after easing 0.9 per cent in the previous quarter.

For the whole of 2017, prices of retail space slipped 8.8 per cent after contracting 5.4 per cent in 2016.

As at the end of Q4 2017, there was a total supply of 509,000 square metres (sq m) gross floor area (GFA) of retail space from projects in the pipeline - lower than the 556,000 sq m GFA in the previous quarter.

The amount of occupied retail space expanded by 64,000 sq m (nett) in Q4 2017, compared with the increase of 15,000 sq m (nett) in the previous quarter.

The stock of retail space rose 18,000 sq m (nett) in Q4 2017, compared with the increase of 22,000 sq m (nett) in the previous quarter.

As a result, the islandwide vacancy rate of retail space dropped to 7.4 per cent as at the end of Q4 2017 from 8.2 per cent as at the end of the previous quarter.