Reported in The Star on 7th August, Knight Frank estimated a new supply of 4,318 condominiums to be completed within the next three years. This would be the high-end residential units and it is thus on a growth cycle with demand at 2,000 per annum. If you look at this, number wise, it meant that the demand for these units still exceed that of supply. So, perhaps prices would be healthy moving forward. According to Knight Frank Malaysia, despite all the negative sentiments in the market currently, with transactions continuously going down, the Kota Kinabalu property market has remained buoyant and stable during the first half of 2014.
Three main primary factors would affect the property market and these are the much more strict measures in place, the electricity tariff hikes and the GST in April 2015. It specifically mentioned the southern corridor of the city as it has many new major projects such as Imago shopping mall, The Loft apartments, Oceanus waterfront mall, Pelagos Suites, Riverson and Gleneagles private hospital. Knight Frank Malaysia (Sabah Branch) associate director Ginn Lai expects the second half of this year and early 2015 to pick up in terms of new major development launches and announcements, particularly in the new development precincts of the old Jesselton port area and Tanjung Aru Eco Development. Land prices are becoming scarce and prices going up.
Personally, I am in Kota Kinabalu once a year. I still feel there’s too many ‘non-Malaysians’ in the city centre but I could see the growth, new malls, more and more people there and the many new condos being built. Besides that, not to be forgotten is the fact that people all over Sabah sees Kota Kinabalu as THE city to be if they want to upgrade themselves. Chinese calls it, ‘Ya Pi’. My brother in law drives to Kota Kinabalu a few times every year from Sandakan because that is where the action is. Beaches fronting the South China Sea, snorkelling, climbing Mount Kinabalu, the reasons are endless. Nevertheless, I do not believe anyone can predict what’s the actual demand because this is definitely a continuously growing city. Oh yeah, do note that Kota Kinabalu International airport serves much more visitors per year compared to even Penang’s International Airport.
written on 26 Aug 2014
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