Investor Marc Faber said China’s economy will slow and possibly “crash” within a year as declines in stock and commodity prices signal the nation’s property bubble is set to burst. The Shanghai Composite Index has failed to regain its 2009 high while industrial commodities and shares of Australian resource exporters are acting “heavy,” Faber said. The opening [...]

bubble, China, housing, Interest rates, investments, reserves, stock market Hide

March 29 (Bloomberg) — China’s banking regulator ordered lenders to take more care when making real-estate loans, widening efforts to prevent property speculators from causing asset bubbles and bad debt. Banks should not lend to developers found by state agencies to have held land without building houses, the government said in a statement posted online late on [...]

China, credit, housing, housing loans Hide

HONG KONG : Hong Kong property consultants said the government’s move to raise transaction taxes for luxury apartments will do little to stabilise residential prices. However, they said plans to increase residential land supply will help. The measures were announced in the government’s Budget speech on Wednesday, and are aimed at averting a property bubble [...]

Hong Kong, housing Hide

The Great Bailout is mostly over for the banks. But for those troubled behemoths of the nation’s housing bust, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the lifeline from Washington just keeps getting longer. Fifteen months after Fannie [FNM  1.01   -0.02  (-1.94%)   ] and Freddie [FRE  1.21  -0.02  (-1.63%)   ] were effectively nationalized, neither the Obama administration nor Congressional leaders see a quick solution to [...]

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For Singaporeans looking to invest in property, the home market is just one option. Ms Jacqueline Wong, head of residential at Jones Lang LaSalle (JLL), says that as prime residential properties in Singapore become more expensive, investing overseas becomes an affordable option. This year, investors may want to venture further – particularly to Britain and [...]

housing, housing loans, investments, UK Hide

I REFER to last Monday’s report, ‘Moneylenders target HDB sellers‘, which mentioned that ‘agents…introduce desperate sellers to moneylenders, and may get a fee for the referral, usually about $500 a customer’. The Singapore Accredited Estate Agencies does not support the practice of estate agents obtaining referral fees from moneylenders for introducing their clients to them. [...]

credit, debt, housing loans, Singapore Hide

BEIJING, Jan 14, 2010 (AFP) – Property prices in Chinese cities continued to soar in December, rising at the fastest pace in 17 months, official figures released Thursday showed. Property prices in 70 medium and large cities increased by 7.8 percent in the last month of 2009 from a year earlier, and 1.5 percent from [...]

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SINGAPORE - The Government of Singapore Investment Corp (GIC) has written down most of its US$675 million investment in a giant New York apartment complex that was bought at the height of the property boom in the United States but which has since suffered from the collapse of the housing market there. The joint owners of [...]

housing, investment banks, Singapore, US Hide

Thousands of American homeowners are starting to see their monthly mortgage payments skyrocket, dealing a fresh blow to the already shaky housing recovery. The widely feared reset of thousands of option adjustable-rate mortgages—where both interest and principal payments rise sharply—is already leaving many homeowners struggling to keep a roof over their head. “It’s going to [...]

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BEIJING: China ordered vigilance against foreign “hot money” flows and speculative real estate investment on Sunday in its latest expression of concern over a surging property market. The order issued by the State Council, or Cabinet, called on authorities nationwide to take a range of measures to “promote the stable and healthy development of the [...]

China, housing, inflation Hide