市場展望

Hong Kong Island Grade-A office leasing demand remained soft in December amid weak economic conditions and the traditional offseason, but the overall market was buoyed by the professional sector, particularly the finance and legal service industries, which took up space in premium buildings in the CBD area. Two Chinese Mainland financial companies, the Bank of Dongguan and FountainVest Partners, leased an entire floor in Two IFC, which was previously occupied by Nomura Holdings. Medical companies also expanded their footprint in the core districts. A medical centre leased the entire top floor of 9 Queen’s Road Central to meet the increasing demand for healthcare and wellbeing. Given the weak economic situation, some tenants gave up more office space. With the current high vacancy rate of 7.8% on Hong Kong Island, we expect some landlords to soften their approach and be more willing to negotiate.

Kowloon Leasing activity in Kowloon continued to slow down in December. New lease transactions dropped by 20% on a monthly basis. Most of the leasing activity was in Kowloon East, at monthly rents below HK$25 per sq ft. While most industries have been largely affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, the logistics industry has remained strong and is one of the winners. Some logistics companies have taken advantage of this golden opportunity in the downbeat market to expand and upgrade their work environment and location. A recent notable example was the relocation of logistics giant DHL. It moved out of Megabox and took up a 91,015 sq ft space in the premium Grade A office International Trade Tower in Kwun Tong, making it the largest new lease acquisition in the market so far in 2020.After reviewing its office requirements, DHL chose to reconfigure its work pattern and adopt agile work practices to achieve workplace size optimisation. Curtailed by the pandemic and economic uncertainty, tenants will continue to be cost-sensitive and seek cost-effective options in Kowloon. Given the approach of the traditional festive season and the continuing unstable COVID-19 situation, we expect leasing demand to remain soft and the current low-level leasing volume to last until at least Lunar New Year.

In this January 2021 issue, we take a look at the latest updates on the local commercial real estate market as well as share an outlook for the sector in 2021.

• While the gradual return to office is expected this year, the office segment may not immediately return to its pre-pandemic vibrancy as the uncertain global business environment may continue to affect expansion decisions of businesses over the short to medium term. The office segment, however, is seen to benefit from the anticipated growth of the IT-BPM sector with the United States’ less protectionist policies under its new administration.
  
• The new COVID-19 variant has caused renewed anxiety and further stalls the resumption of international travel. It is also seen to discourage domestic travel as the country extends the more stringent community quarantine qualification in major urban areas and tourist destinations, thus, further blurring the tourism industry outlook.

Q4 2020 was a crucial quarter as it marked a recovery momentum with leasing indicators trending favourably compared to the previous couple of quarters. In a time of change with COVID upending the workplace playbook, the leasing trends and occupier strategies are undergoing a rapid shift and will have a bearing on market activity. Even as the COVID scenario was evolving and occupiers continued with evaluating their real estate portfolios and charting their space requirements, almost all the cities saw heightened levels of market activity with expansion driven demand making a comeback of sorts as well.  Mumbai, Pune, Delhi NCR, Ahmedabad, and Kolkata have witnessed higher fresh leasing activity for expansion and consolidation during the last quarter of the year. This augurs well for the leasing momentum in 2021, which is likely to get broad-based across cities with introduction of a vaccine and a gradual return to the workplace providing the much-needed push to market activity. 

In this report, we analyse the Indian office markets’ performance in Q4 as well as during the full year of 2020.  

Although office leasing activity was generally more muted in Q4 compared to other quarters in the year, it was broadly similar to Q4/2019 levels.

• Demand for office space largely emanated from tenants looking for replacement space because of the need to move out of older buildings to be redeveloped, as well as tenants with office leases due for renewal.

• Owing to the uncertainties arising from the pandemic, tenants are continuing to adopt a wait-and-see approach and looking for clarity on trends to emerge on future workplace practices before deciding on future office space requirements.

• In Q4, the office market saw relatively significant leasing deals from technology companies. These companies are expected to continue expanding their presence in Singapore, which they deem as an attractive base due to its political stability, strategic position and strong economic fundamentals.

ストラタオフィス市場の見通し

•  2021年、シンガポールの分譲オフィス市場は、より大規模なオフィスセクターと同様に、引き続き厳しい状況が続くと予想されます。これは、パンデミック後の時代において、リモートワークのプロトコルが進化する中で、企業がスペースの占有方法を厳しく見直そうとしていることが背景にあります。そのため、取引量と価格は少なくとも年初6ヶ月間は低迷すると予想されます。.
• しかしながら、オフィス利用者がスペース要件を合理化し適正化するにつれて、小規模企業などのテナントは、テナントスペースに代わる現実的な選択肢として、オーナーが入居するストラタオフィスに目を向けるようになる可能性があります。そのため、ストラタオフィス、特に都心部に位置するストラタオフィスの需要は、2021年後半に改善する可能性があります。.

ストラタ小売市場の見通し

• 今後、ワクチンの配布が進んでいるにもかかわらず、他国での感染再拡大により、世界経済の見通しは依然として不透明です。また、ワクチンの配布が成功したとしても、シンガポールの分譲住宅の価格は低迷すると予想されます。観光客の減少と安全な距離確保措置の継続により、売却価格の下落が予想されます。.
• このような分譲住宅の需要は、自ら事業を営むことを希望し、分譲住宅型商業施設が一般的に立地する場所に店舗を構えることを好む経営者から生まれると予想されます。多くの場合、同じ場所にある一流ショッピングモールで店舗スペースを借りるよりもコストが低いことが、最大の誘因となります。.
• したがって、小売市場がより体験的な場所づくり戦略へと傾倒し、一部のサービスをデジタル プラットフォームに移行するにつれて、階層型小売店のオーナーも同様の方法を採用して、絶えず変化する市場で生き残る必要が高まっています。.

2020 was a challenging year for Philippine real estate and the global property market, but we see the new year as a promising time for sectors such as industrial & logistics, office, residential, REITs, and data centers, among others. The industrial & logistics sector was the most stable asset class in the past year, and there are huge opportunities in the e-commerce and the rollout of COVID-19 vaccines. The office sector is likely to perform better than 2020, while we anticipate residential real estate to exhibit a slow but gradual rebound.

In 2021, macrotrends such as the boom of e-commerce, flexible office setups, and continued decentralization outside Metro Manila
are likely to continue and contribute to the property market’s soft recovery.

The Philippine population, which has grown at 1.5% on average each year since 2015, is key to recovery. This growth has created a “demographic sweet spot” and continues to drive consumption and, in particular, the expansion of online retail and the related logistics platforms. The young Philippine population will also continue to keep the country at the forefront of the global BPO industry as outsourcing continues to increase.

Global Economy

• Global growth estimated to decline by 3.5% in 2020 but expected to rise by 5.5% in 2021
• Advanced economies likely to grow by 4.3% in 2021 on the back of the early rollout of vaccines
• Emerging economies are expected to grow by 6.3% in 2021 on the back of a contracted base

Indian Economy 

• India’s GDP growth for FY21 is estimated to decline by 7.7%, hit by the global pandemic and the lockdown
• Private consumption estimated to contract by 9.5% in FY21 based on income loss, mobility restrictions, and supply constraints
• Government consumption estimated to rise by 5.8% due to increased expenditure as part of pandemic relief packages.
• Investment estimated to decline by 14.5% due to economic uncertainty and delay in implementation of capital projects

見通し 

• Consumption indicators, including FMCG, auto sales, and GST collection indicate a faster demand recovery in Q3
• Continued momentum post-pandemic in health, pharma, telecom, and technology (e-commerce, fintech, ed-tech, etc.) owing to a significant shift in consumption patterns
• The pandemic has led to a preference for digital services and adoption of digitalisation in many companies
• GDP is estimated to grow at 11% in FY22 owing to robust growth in consumption and investment and lower base effect

The pandemic has induced behavioural changes amongst consumers that are likely to stay permanent. This has hit the physical retail and F&B sectors hardest and the industry has to be quick to adapt to this new reality in order to nurture the sector back to recovery, albeit in an evolved form.

Footfall numbers will be hard-pressed to return to pre-COVID levels so long as the need to social distance is enforced. The takeaway channel is therefore vital. With incomes falling and unemployment rising, food delivery companies are seeing a decline in activity from the peaks witnessed in the months of April and May. Parents are telling their children now not to order frivolously. Footfall ebbs and flows with some days seeing much greater activity than others (same as our office – some days we have 30% of the workers back while for most of the time, it’s just 15% to 20%). It is difficult to predict the daily flow these days. Whenever helicopter money is disbursed by the government, the crowd emerges in the suburbs. But give it about 10 days and the patronage falls back to pre-payout levels.

The points highlighted above are summarised in the following heatmaps. Table 1A and 1B show the heatmap of revenues by broad tenant types in CBD and Suburban locations. These are the findings obtained after spending weeks soliciting feedback from various retail and F&B operators plus plying the grounds to weed off the weekend-weekday effects.

WHEN CULTURAL VALUE BECOMES COMMERCIAL VALUE AND TRANSFORMS INTO INVESTMENT GAINS.

• The total shophouse transaction value amounted to S$880.7 million in 2020, riding out the pandemic with only a slight 3.8% year-on-year (y-o-y) decline when compared to the S$915.9 million recorded in 2019, as sales in Q4 2020 rebounded to surpass pre-pandemic levels. Gross sales value in the quarter alone accounted for almost half of 2020 shophouse sales value at S$431.8 million.
• The shophouse sales volume was also greater in 2020 compared to the previous year, with 138 transactions lodged as compared to 123 in 2019 (Exhibit 1). The majority (88.4%) sold were freehold shophouses. Q4 2020 saw a total of 51 shophouse transactions, 19 more than in Q3 when sales started to recover.
• Aided by lower costs of borrowing and high liquidity in the market, pent-up demand from different pools of buyers such as first-time investors as well as family offices and corporates contributed to the overall recovery of the shophouse market, especially towards the last quarter of the year. Price expectations between buyers and sellers were realistically met, leading to the materialisation of sales.

厳しい市場にもチャンスは残されている

パンデミックとそれに起因する経済ショックに見舞われた年であったが、中国は急速に立ち直り、2020年の経済拡大を記録した数少ない国のひとつとなった。2021年に向けて、生活、仕事、経済の多くの側面が、デジタル技術の大幅な進歩と採用の拡大によって根本的に変化している。とはいえ、COVID-19の前の段階から、債務水準、気候変動問題、経済の安定性など、根強く残る大きな構造的問題にも取り組んでいく。.

不動産市場では、2021年に課題と機会がもたらされる。住宅販売セクターはデレバレッジのための規制強化に直面し、成長が鈍化し需要が抑制される。しかし、資本を持つ人々は、富を蓄え、維持し、成長させるために投資を続けるだろう。渡航制限により、出向者や帰国駐在員の数は制限されているが、事業者は、リースの利点に気づきつつある地元顧客層の増加に合わせて、サービスや施設を迅速に調整している。商業セクターは供給過剰に直面しているが、クリエイティブな環境を育み、テナントの柔軟性を高めることができる家主は市場シェアを維持できるだろう。オンライン・プラットフォームが小売売上高に占める割合は引き続き拡大しているが、ユニークな体験や社会的交流への渇望により、実店舗がブランドと消費者を結ぶ重要な接点であり続けている。. 

物流セクターの成長は、規制や厳しい土地許可に阻まれているが、3PLやeコマース・プラットフォームからの需要は依然として旺盛だ。投資が後退し、ベンダーが資金調達の制限からより大きなプレッシャーを感じる中、より高い成長の機会を求めて伝統的な商業セクターからの投資は敬遠されてきたが、機会が現れ始めており、活動レベルは回復し始めると予想される。. 

寻路向前

尽管2020年初爆发疫情带来巨大冲击，但中国经济迅速反弹，成为全年经济同比增长的少数几个国家之一伴随数字技术的进步和广推，我们的生活，工作和经济活动都在发生变化，此外也需积极应对债务，气候，经济稳定等长期存在的结构性挑战。

2021年的房地产市场挑战和机遇并存。住宅销售市场正面临监管加码，短期市场需求或将因此受限，但市场中长期价值前景并未改变，仍是财富保值及增值的重要去向。高端租赁市场持续演进，旅行限制影响外籍租客需求，但本地租客需求上升、日趋多样，为业主带来调整机会。写字楼市场存在局部供应放量，而能为租户创造创意环境和灵活空间的业主将占据优势。零售商纷纷发力电商平台，但顾客对独特体验和社交互动的诉求说明，实体店依然是品牌和消费者沟通的重要渠道。

物流行业的增长受到政策和土地许可的限制，但来自第三方物公司和电子商务平台的需求有增无减。物流和数据中心的高增长潜力令一些投资者从统物业领域转向利资产。