Hong Kong Private Housing Construction Reaches 16-Year High
- Housing starts rose 80 percent in 2016 to 25,500, data show
- Curbs introduced in November didn’t dent fourth-quarter starts
Residential buildings stand in the Choi Hung, front, and the Tseung Kwan O district, back, of Hong Kong, China, on Tuesday, Aug. 25, 2015. Prices of existing homes have risen 9 percent this year in Hong Kong, according to Centaline Property Agency Ltd.
Photographer: Justin Chin/BloombergHong Kong’s construction of private residential units reached a 16-year high in 2016, a year that the city’s leaders stepped up efforts to cool the world’s costliest property market.
Developers started building a total of 25,500 private apartments last year, up 80 percent from 2015, the Transport and Housing Bureau said in a release on its website on Friday. That was the highest since 2000, when housing starts were at 30,100 units. Some 94,000 units will become available to buyers in the next three to four years, according to the bureau.