Real Estate Bliss in Singapore

Like the Hamptons for affluent New Yorkers, Singapore emerges as the go-to real estate hot spot - replacing Hong Kong - for wealthy Chinese. "It confers class status in China to say that you own a flat in Singapore," asserts Mohamed Ismail.

1 minute read

August 7, 2011, 1:00 PM PDT

By Jeff Jamawat


A few hundreds units short of 18,000, the number of home sales in Singapore last year was greater than all record-breaking figures achieved prior to 2007 before the market went south. By and large, interest rate below 1% helps stimulate and sustain the activity in the housing sector.

The Economist reports:

For an island nation roughly the size of San Francisco, "[t]he boom has also been pushed along by rich foreign buyers. About 16% of private units are now bought by outsiders. Singapore has always been a popular place for wealthy Indonesians and Malaysians to park their money, but the big difference now is the influx of Indians and, more importantly, Chinese."

Saturday, August 6, 2011 in The Economist

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