HOUSE and lot residential projects are regarded as bright spots in the full recovery of the residential property sector.
Joey Roi Bondoc, associate director for research at Colliers International Philippines, in a virtual Visayas-Mindanao property briefing on Thursday, March 3, 2022, said it is the horizontal demand that will anchor growth in the residential take-up in the property development sector with economic to mid-income housing units dominating the take-up.
“The house and lot projects are doing very well. In fact, a lot of developers are wrapping up launches and really maximizing the available infrastructure that will be completed beyond 2022. The completion of the bridges, airports and bus rapid transit in Cebu will definitely anchor growth in the residential market,” said Bondoc.
“A lot of people now are having that optimism now to consider acquiring residential investments,” he added.
House and lot inventory in Cebu stood at 21,060 with a new supply of 410 units last year. Take-up last year was at 1,940 units down 48 percent. The top-selling price segment last year was in the mid-income segment.
Aberdeen Place Cebu is the most expensive house and lot project outside Metro Manila at P34 million average total contract price (TCP) as of the end of 2021.
Aberdeen Place is the flagship ultra-high-end residential project developed by Colourfield Land Development Corp., a member of the Belmont Group that is a recognized leader in the home finishing and hardware industry.
In the vertical space, Cebu’s condominium inventory stood at 56,580 units while the average new supply between 2022 and 2025 will be about 5,230 units. Condo take-up in 2021 was at 3,020 units down by 42 percent. The top-selling price segment last year was in the affordable segment.
Cebu’s most expensive condominium is The Residences at The Sheraton Cebu Mactan Resort with a selling price of P257,000 per square meter as of the end of 2021.
Karla Domingo, associate director for advisory services at Colliers, said Cebu is still the biggest and most mature market for the residential sector in the Visayas and Mindanao.
In 2021, Cebu sold 2,700 condominium units.
“Imagine if the office investors are back, so would the residential investors. The leisure, imagine if they are back and the overseas Filipino workers (OFW) buying into residential condominiums, these would contribute to the growth of sales for the residential market in Cebu,” she said.
Luxury segment
Moreover, Domingo said there is also high demand in the high-end residential segment.
“We saw some launches in the high-end market. They were indeed taken up. Investors are also looking at diversifying their properties so not just vertical residential condominiums but also in high-end lot-only, especially in the mountain areas and in the fringes of Cebu City near leisure properties in Mactan, Liloan, Danao and the uptown part of Cebu, very near the mountainside,” Domingo said.
The current average price for lot-only is around P15,700 per square meter or a range of between P10,000 and P40,000 per square meter depending on the location of the project and the developer.
Lot-only inventory in Cebu is at 8,500 units. About 500 units will come in as new supply.
The most expensive lot-only project in Cebu is The Peaks of Monterrazas de Cebu at P22.6 million average TCP as of the end of 2021.
“Overall we are optimistic about the growth of the property market in 2022. Amid the local and global developments, the property market has legs to stand on coupled with the country’s forecasted economic growth at a much stronger pace beyond 2022,” said Bondoc.
Besides the acceleration of infrastructure projects in Cebu that could raise property valuations, OFW remittances will continue to uplift the industry moving forward.
It is expected that remittances will grow by four percent this year as OFWs will be redeployed to their host countries.
Remittances last year rose 5.1 percent to US$31.6 billion.