Harrow School draws new families, pushing up rents

Flat rents in So Kwun Wat, Tuen Mun, have surged since the opening in the area of the Harrow International School.

"Rents in the area have risen by about 27 per cent from HK$15 per square foot to HK$19 per sq ft over the last few months," said Ricky Ng Pang-hung, deputy district manager at Midland Realty in So Kwun Wat.

"That has happened as other districts have seen residential rents falling. But here we have new demand because the Harrow School has attracted families from Island South and Sai Kung." Summer is the peak season for the residential leasing market and many families have relocated into the district before the school year starts in September. According to Midland, 125 leasing transactions were recorded in the area last month, a surge of almost 70 per cent over the 75 transactions recorded in May.

"As those families previously lived in other districts and are not familiar with So Kwun Wat, most prefer to rent a flat in the district at first rather than buy immediately," said Ng. Almost a third of the new tenants are mainlanders, while the remainder were divided between local and other non-Hong Kong residents.

Most of the families with children enrolled in the Harrow International School were looking for 2,000 sq ft flats or houses at monthly rents of about HK$40,000.

With the strong demand and tight housing supply, monthly rents of houses with a saleable area of 2,133 sq ft at Aqua Blue have now doubled to HK$100,000 in three years.