HK listed firm to buy luxury house for near-record price

A Hong Kong listed firm said it plans to purchase a luxury house for a near-record price in the city, a month after the HK government introduced measures to cool the city's property market.

According to the electronics components maker Sino-tech International Holdings, it has agreed to acquire the 4,650-sq-ft property on the Peak for HK$280 million (S$50.42 million), or HK$60,215 psf, as an investment.

The per-sq-ft price is one of the highest paid for a property in the southern Chinese city, after Henderson Land Development sold a duplex in October for an Asian record of HK$71,280 psf.

The Peak property is among the 22 houses in the luxurious Severn 8 project on Severn Road, which The Wealth Bulletin, an online analysis group, named as one of the 10 most expensive streets in the world last year.

Also on the list were Fifth Avenue in New York, Chemin de Saint-Hospice in the South of France, and Kensington Palace Gardens in London.

Despite a series of measures introduced by the government last month to cool the white-hot property market, including a stamp duty for luxury flats and increasing residential land supply, the near-record price was hit.

The government was worried that the property frenzy, as supported by a vast inflow of funds and strong demand from affluent mainland buyers, would form a bubble and affect the stability of the financial system, said John Tsang, the city’s financial secretary.

Mr. Tsang said that in January, prices of some luxury flats returned to the peaks of the 1997 property boom.

Stimulus measures by governments around the world have boosted liquidity, which has led to large fund inflows into Asia.

China has also seen surging prices of properties, with values increasing at their fastest pace in 17 months in December after Beijing encouraged tax breaks, loans and reduced down payment requirements to boost the sector during the economic turmoil.