The week in real estate: the world’s most expensive house, luxury care homes, and more

Friday’s round up of the past week in real estate happenings from around the globe

Property Report has selected the top stories and best new research from the past week.

New research out this week

JLL Hong Kong Residential Sales Market research August 2016

This report discusses the growing pipeline of small-scale apartments. In the past month developers in Hong Kong wanting to cash in on improved buyer sentiment have hurried to launch sales for their mass residential projects.

Read the research here.

Knight Frank Prime Asia Development Land Index – H1 2016

The Prime Asia Development Land Index charts the derived price of prime residential and commercial development land across Asia’s key markets.

Read the research here.

Country news

India

A background paper from KPMG has suggested that come 2030, India will have the third largest real estate market in the world.

The paper suggests a race against time for all Indian households due to exploding population levels. By 2022, India will need to build 110 million homes to shelter the entire populace, in both urban and rural areas.

China

With Shanghai’s home and land prices sky-high, the government is planning a new wave of cooling methods.

These measures will include requiring first-time buyers to fork out 50 percent of the property’s value as down payment instead of the current 30 percent. The commission also plans to increase the loan-to-value ratio for second home purchases to 70 percent.

In data by the National Bureau of Statistics, average new home prices in Shanghai climbed 27 percent in July from a year earlier. Beijing and Shenzhen are not far behind, with increases of 21 percent and 41 percent, respectively.

Canada

Recently named the most expensive luxury market in the world, Vancouver’s mainstream residential property sector turns out to have been cooling all along.

With the exception of luxury properties, average prices for residential units sold in the Greater Vancouver area have dipped dramatically in the last 28 days, according to Canadian national real estate brokerage Zolo, which arrived at the data by analysing values in real time rather than historical information.

Worlds most expensive home hits the market

Word that the world’s most expensive house is on the market flooded the internet this week, with an asking price of USD1.1 billion.

Villa Les Cèdres, which is located in the “billionaires playground” area of Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat, near Nice, was built in around 1830 and was previously home to King Leopold II of Belgium.

The property is currently owned by Suzanne Marnier-Lapostolle, a member of the Grand Marnier family. The family, famous for cognacs and liquers, has resided here since the 1920s, but are now seeking somewhere smaller.

Trends

We’re noticing a rise in demand for luxury retirement residences.

This week, Property Report wrote how in China, affluent retirees are now seeking luxury care homes for their old age, eschewing the traditional path of living as a family unit.

Similarly, in Australia, senior citizens are leading the way in terms of demand for luxury skyscraper apartments. Convenience and lower maintenance costs as compared with larger properties on land are driving this trend.

Proving this is not just in APAC, two weeks ago in London, a GBP200 million (USD261 million) luxury retirement home in Knightsbridge was approved by the Kensington and Chelsea council. The property will be linked by a walkway to the historic department store Harrods.

At the other end of the age scale, it’s been reported that there is an increase in demand for luxury student accommodation in the UK.

Olympics

The closing ceremony for the Olympics took place this week, a good opportunity to remember our feature from earlier in the month about the state of the real estate market in Brazil – No gold medals for Brazil real estate.

Source: Property Report