Mystery owner of Asia’s priciest apartment at Hong Kong’s Mid-Levels is revealed to be a buyer with a name spelt in pinyin

Yin Xi was stated as the buyer of Flat 1 on the 23rd floor of 21 Borrett Road, according to Land Registry documents. The five-bedroom apartment was developed by CK Asset Holdings, and sold through tender.

The price that Yin paid, at HK$136,000 per square foot, smashed the record held since 2017 by two luxury apartments at Mount Nicholson, which had been Asia’s most expensive address on a per square foot basis.

Little is known about Yin. The buyer’s name is identical to the director of five closely held companies, according to the Cyber Search Centre of the Integrated Companies Registry Information System. They are Better Living Group Limited, Maxrange International Limited, MCNA Property Investment Limited, Novel Energy Trading Limited and Novel Wealth Management Limited.

Yin is a Hong Kong permanent resident as documents showed that the buyer only paid a basic stamp duty of 4.25 per cent for the Borrett Road property, about HK$19.52 million. Non-permanent residents in the city must pay an extra 15 per cent the price of the property as stamp duty.

The buyer “could be any private business owner with deep pockets, not necessarily a well-known tycoon, since HK$400 million is not really a huge sum to them,” said Vincent Cheung, the managing director of Vincorn Consulting and Appraisal. “In the long-run, wealthy billionaires from the mainland are still the driving force of Hong Kong’s luxury housing market.”