PropertyGuru Survey shows Positive Outlook for Singapore Property Market
First quarterly survey by Singapore's leading property site reflects current market sentiments as economy stabilises
Online, May 19, 2010 (Newswire.com) - Singapore, 18 May 2010 - PropertyGuru, Singapore's leading property site, today revealed the results of its first survey that aims to measure property market sentiments among Singaporeans and create a property sentiment index.
Conducted in April 2010, the survey showed that majority of consumers have a positive outlook towards the property market, with many intending to purchase property over the next 24 months for investment and an anticipation of increasing prices for both HDB and private property sectors.
2,280 respondents participated in the survey from 1 April 2010 to 12 May 2010. The research was conducted by Pulse Group PLC, a leading research agency, to measure property market sentiments in the first quarter of 2010.
Mr Steve Melhuish, CEO and Co-Founder of PropertyGuru, said, "We chose to work with Pulse because of their expertise in working with major organisations on large scale surveys including those analyzing sentiment ."
The survey will be repeated every quarter to show the latest sentiments of consumers towards the property market. This includes tracking a consumer property sentiment index.
Mr Steve Melhuish, CEO and Co-Founder of PropertyGuru, said, "Investor confidence in the property market remains strong after a bullish 2009. This comprehensive survey taking results from over 2,200 people within the last 6 weeks was created to gauge the market sentiments in our dynamic property market. As Singapore's biggest property website with 1.6 million monthly users, we are in a strong position take a temperature of the property market and consumer's sentiments towards future property decisions."
Some of the key findings of the survey include:
Property market sentiment
40% are looking to upgrade in the next 12 months, while 7% are thinking of downgrading.
75% feel that property prices in private homes and HDBs will increase in the next 12 months.
27% of those that think property prices will increase say that they intend to upgrade in the next 12 months, while the majority of them (65%) plan to neither upgrade nor downgrade.
75% feel that Singapore properties are too expensive
58% of respondents feel that the Government is not doing enough to keep property prices in Singapore affordable
Buying behaviour
75% of active property seekers are looking to purchase a property in the next 24 months, with 10% expecting to buy 2 or more properties.
39% of respondents buy their first property for their own stay
50% purchase property for investment purposes and to generate rental income
Majority of property investors are at least 35 years old
Top motivation factors in purchase of property include location, price, capital appreciation. Interestingly, 17% would take into account the developer's brand
Media Usage For Property Search
73% of respondents use the Internet to start their property search process
The key reasons for using Internet were for finding sales/rental property, carrying out property research and reading property news
56% of people use the Internet for at least 3 hours per week for property search
Steve added, "The survey shows that the majority consumers feel positive about the property market and intended to buy at least one property within the next 2 years. However, they also think the real estate is too expensive and would prefer the Government to take further action to cool prices. In addition, a large 73% of people surveyed said they use Internet to start their property search process, compared to other media. This online adoption is reflected in PropertyGuru's 300% growth in users over the last 12 months."
End -First quarterly survey by Singapore's leading property site
reflects current market sentiments as economy stabilises
Singapore, 18 May 2010 - PropertyGuru, Singapore's leading property site, today revealed the results of its first survey that aims to measure property market sentiments among Singaporeans and create a property sentiment index.
Conducted in April 2010, the survey showed that majority of consumers have a positive outlook towards the property market, with many intending to purchase property over the next 24 months for investment and an anticipation of increasing prices for both HDB and private property sectors.
2,280 respondents participated in the survey from 1 April 2010 to 12 May 2010. The research was conducted by Pulse Group PLC, a leading research agency, to measure property market sentiments in the first quarter of 2010.
Mr Steve Melhuish, CEO and Co-Founder of PropertyGuru, said, "We chose to work with Pulse because of their expertise in working with major organisations on large scale surveys including those analyzing sentiment ."
The survey will be repeated every quarter to show the latest sentiments of consumers towards the property market. This includes tracking a consumer property sentiment index.
Mr Steve Melhuish, CEO and Co-Founder of PropertyGuru, said, "Investor confidence in the property market remains strong after a bullish 2009. This comprehensive survey taking results from over 2,200 people within the last 6 weeks was created to gauge the market sentiments in our dynamic property market. As Singapore's biggest property website with 1.6 million monthly users, we are in a strong position take a temperature of the property market and consumer's sentiments towards future property decisions."
Some of the key findings of the survey include:
Property market sentiment
40% are looking to upgrade in the next 12 months, while 7% are thinking of downgrading.
75% feel that property prices in private homes and HDBs will increase in the next 12 months.
27% of those that think property prices will increase say that they intend to upgrade in the next 12 months, while the majority of them (65%) plan to neither upgrade nor downgrade.
75% feel that Singapore properties are too expensive
58% of respondents feel that the Government is not doing enough to keep property prices in Singapore affordable
Buying behaviour
75% of active property seekers are looking to purchase a property in the next 24 months, with 10% expecting to buy 2 or more properties.
39% of respondents buy their first property for their own stay
50% purchase property for investment purposes and to generate rental income
Majority of property investors are at least 35 years old
Top motivation factors in purchase of property include location, price, capital appreciation. Interestingly, 17% would take into account the developer's brand
Media Usage For Property Search
73% of respondents use the Internet to start their property search process
The key reasons for using Internet were for finding sales/rental property, carrying out property research and reading property news
56% of people use the Internet for at least 3 hours per week for property search
Steve added, "The survey shows that the majority consumers feel positive about the property market and intended to buy at least one property within the next 2 years. However, they also think the real estate is too expensive and would prefer the Government to take further action to cool prices. In addition, a large 73% of people surveyed said they use Internet to start their property search process, compared to other media. This online adoption is reflected in PropertyGuru's 300% growth in users over the last 12 months."
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Media Contact
Clarence Lim
Flame Communications
Contact number: 6253 3193 / 9009 5604
Email: [email protected]
Ms Winnie Khoo
AllProperty Media Pte Ltd
Contact number: 6238 5971
Email: [email protected]
About PropertyGuru
www.PropertyGuru.com.sg
www.PropertyGuru.com.sg is Singapore's leading property and home site and the brainchild of AllProperty Media Pte Ltd, a local firm established in 2006. The site recently won the CNBC "Worlds Best Property Award" as well as the CNBC Asia Pacific Property Awards for "Best Property Portal Asia Pacific" in 2009 and "Best Property Portal Singapore" in 2008 and 2009. According to Experian Hitwise Singapore (Experian.com.sg), PropertyGuru is the leading property portal in Singapore.
www.PropertyGuru.com.sg provides real time access to multi-media rich content covering property and home-related products, services, news, advice, guides, tools and largest online property database in Singapore. It works closely with prominent real estate developers in Singapore and overseas, over 15,000 housing agents, and home-related firms.
The site is used by over 1.6 million consumers who view 25 million pages and generate over 125,000 leads for advertisers every month (sources: Hitwise, Google Insights and Alexa.com). PropertyGuru's user base has consistently grown by 15% per month since its launch. These users are 'mass affluent' and comprise 53% earning over $100k, 13% over $250k pa; 35% expatriates; 85% live in Singapore, 15% overseas (foreigners and Singapore expats); 32% own 2 or more properties (source: survey conducted by Aktiv Digital with 800 respondents).
About Pulse Group PLC
www.pulse-group.com
Pulse Group plc is a holding company whose wholly owned subsidiary, Pulse BPO Sdn. Bhd.(together, the "Pulse Group"), is a leading provider of research process outsourced ("RPO") services within the Asia-Pacific region predominantly to market research and media companies, based anywhere around the world, wishing to conduct research within the region. It also provides its services to RPO companies based in other parts of the world who have a need to conduct research within the Asia-Pacific region.
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