Chinanews, Beijing, Jan. 10 – Driven by high demands and the operation of some new real estate projects, Beijing’s real estate market will continue to boom in 2007, said Jones Lang LaSalle, an international real estate intermediate agent, in a recent report.
In predicting the prospects of commercial residential buildings, the report says that the rate of growth for newly built commercial buildings will start to decline in 2007, by 11%-14% depending on their different locations. In most places, housing rental fees will remain stable as they were in 2006 or decline a little bit. Although prices of residential houses will continue to climb during the first half of 2007, their prices will remain stable in the second half of the year. With 2008 Beijing Olympic Games coming near, some potential house buyers might bide their time, therefore transaction volume will fall in the short run.
At the same time, many office buildings will be put to use in 2007. In 2006, the floor space of office buildings for sale in Beijing was 300,000 square meters and it is expected to exceed one million square meters in 2007. The completion schedule of some construction projects might be delayed. However, as most of the office buildings will be put to use as scheduled and these buildings have a large area in total, real estate developers will start to take measures to attract customers to rent their houses between March and May. The rental fees of the current office buildings will remain at the present level in 2007 and in the beginning of 2008, rental fees of these buildings will start to fall, according to the report.
In regard to the leasing situation of vendor stands, the report says that due to the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, the fast growth of the economy and people’s growing income level, retail sales will remain good overall. However, as the market becomes more mature now, investors cannot expect to make much profit in retail sector. Judging from the supply and demand situation, rental fees of vendor stands will rise a little more than the current level. At the same time, many large shopping malls will rent their floor space to vendors, and as a result, the rate of vacant rooms will be smaller than expected.
