The scramble for kindergarten places in North District may bring unintended benefits for those in the area with flats to rent.
Property agents are keeping an eye on a government measure that is under consideration - to give children living closest to a preschool priority enrolment if there are not enough places - which may further raise rents that they claim have doubled in the past two years.
They expect the move to boost demand for properties near popular kindergartens and push up rents by at least 10 per cent this year.
For instance, demand for flats in Tsui Lai Garden and Sheung Shui Wai had grown as they are only a five-minute walk from two popular preschools, Fung Kai Kindergarten and Sheung Shui Church Kindergarten, Thomas Kwong of Sheung Shui Property Agency said.
"Mainland parents are hungry for those flats as they may stand a higher chance of securing places for their children in the nearby schools," he said, adding that more than 80 per cent of the rental deals closed by his agency involved mainlanders.
The proposed measure was announced on Tuesday to assure local parents of preschool places for their children if demand outstripped supply, in the wake of sizeable numbers of mainlanders flocking to border kindergartens to queue up for application forms for the 2014-15 academic year.