Private and HDB rents fall in Feb: SRX

SINGAPORE — Singapore’s rental market continued to show weakness, with rents in both the private and public housing segments declining last month.

A flash report by SRX Property released today (March 11) showed that rents of non-landed private homes fell by 0.8 per cent in February, after staying unchanged in January. On a year-on-year basis, last month’s rents were 6.2 per cent lower than February 2014.

The decline was led by the Rest of Central Region, or city fringe area, where rents dipped 1.5 per cent from the previous month. This was followed by a 1.2 per cent slip seen in the Core Central Region, or city centre. Rents in the Outside Central Region or suburbs were flat.

The fall in overall rents came on the back of a 25.8 per cent decrease in rental transaction in February to an estimated 2,586 units from January’s 3,487 units. Last month’s volume was 5.9 per cent lower than the 2,748 transactions recorded in February 2014.

In the HDB space, rents posted a decline of 0.3 per cent in February compared to the previous month. Year-on-year, this represents a 3 per cent fall from February 2014.

Three- and four-room flats posted declines in rents of 0.8 per cent and 0.6 per cent, respectively. But five-room and executive flats saw a pick-up of 0.7 per cent and 0.5 per cent, respectively.

SRX said an estimated 1,371 HDB flats were rented in last month, down 25.7 per cent from 1,846 units in January. Year-on-year, last month’s rental volume is 6.5 per cent lower compared to 1,467 units rented in February 2014.