The total number of residential licenses in Liudu in the first nine months of this year decreased by 5.4% compared with the same period last year, and the supply of completed housing dropped by nearly 5,000 homes. (Photo by reporter Zhu Yuqiao)
According to construction statistics from the Land and Resources Administration of the Ministry of the Interior, the total number of residential building use licenses issued in Liudu in the first nine months of this year was 81,576 homes, a year-on-year decrease of 5.4% from 86,272 homes in the same period last year. This means that the supply of newly completed homes has slowed down by nearly 5,000 homes. Among the six cities, except for Kaohsiung City and Taichung City, which maintained positive growth of 12% and 0.9%, the other four cities all declined, with Tainan City having the most dramatic annual decline of 42.8%, nearly halved.
Lai Zhengyi, chairman of Xianglin Group, pointed out that the decrease in residential licenses represents a fall in the completion of new houses, which will help the market digest the remaining houses. The housing market structure is expected to gradually stabilize from Q4 to the first half of next year. Most developers still maintain the response strategy of reducing land purchases and new projects in order to prioritize the sale of remaining houses for a short period of time. He predicts that the housing market will still consolidate in the next two years.
Xianglin Real Estate Research Office pointed out that in the first three quarters of this year, the completion and handover wave of houses in various metropolitan areas showed obvious north-south plate displacement. Taichung City, which has the highest number of housing projects among the six metropolitan areas in the past few years, has maintained a housing quota of 20,000 in the first half of this year, but the increase is very small. This shows that the construction frenzy in emerging redistricting areas in the past few years has entered a phased end after two years of rising labor and materials and the seventh wave of credit restrictions. Most developers have generally slowed down the pace of completion and handover. It can be seen that the pace of new housing supply in the six cities has slowed down like the housing market.
It is worth noting that Kaohsiung City became the urban area with the largest growth in residential housing applications in the first nine months among the six cities, with the number of housing applications increasing by 12% to 1,882 homes. This reflects Kaohsiung’s strong momentum in recent years due to industrial transformation, rezoning development, and the intensive completion of new projects. In the past few years, there has been a large-scale construction of science and technology development zones. This year coincides with the handover period. For example, a large number of construction projects accumulated around Nanzi in North Kaohsiung, Qiaotou Science Park, and new rezoning areas in the city are gradually entering the completion and handover period.
Lai Zhengyi said that the number of licenses issued in various metropolitan areas in the first nine months of this year often directly corresponds to the enthusiasm for project promotion and construction progress three or four years ago. For example, the Shuangbei region is sparse and highly dependent on the elderly. In the first three quarters of this year, New Taipei City saw an annual decrease of 12.9% and Taipei City an annual decrease of 7.5%. The combined volume of the two core cities shrank by 20.4%. The overall supply of new housing showed a significant decrease. For the two-north real estate market, this is conducive to the digestion of new supply and existing high-priced remaining houses, building a stable defensive support for housing market prices in the second half of the year.
Looking at the North Beitao area, the total number of leaseholds in the first half of the year decreased by more than 4,044, and the completion time of new houses has slowed down. In the future, the rigid supply in the urban area should be stable. As for the Kaohsiung housing market in southern Taiwan, it may be facing a large number of newly completed houses and is also facing the impact of rising housing prices and regional traffic. How to "balance the living burden of local residents" while ensuring technological development, and incorporating medical and educational facilities around the science and technology park into long-term planning, is an important issue to maintain balanced urban development.
He said that residential development is a long-term project and requires the continuity of policies in addition to public construction. Voters will also examine whether the candidates for mayor of the six cities after being elected can actually integrate new housing, MRT rail transportation, educational resources and childcare services. Even when reviewing urban plans, whether development feedback and corporate labor housing can be included in the overall plan will need to be further proposed and implemented in a phased policy blueprint to improve the quality of life in the urban area.
Mayoral candidates in the six cities will more or less raise residential issues, including continuing to promote the construction of social housing, diversifying supply, reducing the burden of buying and renting houses, and providing stable housing and transportation for married and child-bearing families to win the approval of voters. However, in the reality of high housing prices and high public facilities ratio, all parties are concerned about specific improvement strategies such as "how to ensure transportation construction and living facilities are in place", "a large influx of people in emerging redistricting areas, facing a window period when public facilities and transportation construction cannot catch up", and "paying attention to the timetable for expanding the supply of public kindergartens".
