Capital Markets

Savills Asia Pacific Real Estate Investment Country Guide covers 13 countries around the region including:

• China
• Hong Kong
• India
• Indonesia
• Japan
• Malaysia
• Singapore
• South Korea
• Taiwan
• Thailand
• Vietnam
• UK
• US

This report was originally published in https://www.savills.com.hk/research_articles/167189/207024-0

Executive Summary:

• Office: The positive momentum from end-2021 carried over to Q1 2022 as Singapore remained on the path to reopen its economy.

• Business Parks: Occupier demand has generally improved across all submarkets, with islandwide business parks recording a positive net absorption of 186,982 sq. ft. in Q1 2022.

• Retail: While the recovery of the retail market was still capped by restrictions on social gatherings in most of the quarter, leasing activity continued to be stable.

• Residential: Private home price growth plateaued in Q1 2022 as cooling measures took effect. 1,716 new private homes (excluding ECs) were sold in Q1 2022, below the 5-year quarterly average of 2,614 units.

• Industrial: The industrial market experienced broad-based growth across all segments. Due to limited availability in existing prime logistics buildings, rents inched up by another 1.4% in Q1 2022.

• Investment: Preliminary real estate investment volume in the quarter amounted to $9.994 bn, reaching a 4-year quarterly high and just 5.2% below the Q2 2018 peak of $10.542 bn.

Inflation across the world has reached multi-year highs, driven by a confluence of demand and cost factors. Given Singapore’s small open economy as well as dependence on energy and food imports, the city-state's overall inflation has picked up, rising to 5.4% yoy in March 2022, a decade high.

This report explores the implications of high inflation for real estate, and presents key strategies for owners, investors and occupiers to forge ahead in the inflationary environment. 

The Colliers Quarterly Reports for Q1 2022 reported that market uncertainties delay decision making and curtail transaction volume ahead of expected H2 recovery. Total investment volume slowed down along with the more stringent social-distancing rules in place since late January. Looking ahead, Colliers expects the investment market to remain slow in Q2 but believes market momentum and activities will likely improve in H2 2022. Office space demand weakened in Q1 2022, largely due to inspection activities being held up, resulted in the overall vacancy rate climbed slightly to 10.9% in the quarter.