Evergrande’s Emerald Bay project flops for the second time in two months as buyers stay away amid Hong Kong’s economic slump
- China Evergrande managed to sell 18 flats, or a mere 6.7 per cent of the 269 units on offer at the Emerald Bay project in Tuen Mun as at 8pm
- A month earlier, Evergrande sold one third of the units in Phase One when it decided to offer them during the peak of Hong Kong’s coronavirus outbreak
China Evergrande suffered its second sales flop in two months as Hong Kong’s homebuyers gave their collective cold shoulder to its Emerald Bay flats in Tuen Mun, even after a 14-per cent average discount.
Since then, Hong Kong’s daily confirmed cases have fallen to single digits for six consecutive days, with two new infections today, bringing the city’s total caseload to 1,023, with four lives lost.
Still, that was not enough to attract buyers, in an economy mired in its first recession in decades. Unemployment is expected to rise in Hong Kong, as the services, hospitality and retail industries bear the brunt of more than two months of stay-at-home lockdowns, as city authorities try to contain the outbreak.
The cool reception underscores the correction that is underway in the world’s most expensive residential property market, a slump that still has some way to go, even after the Hong Kong Monetary Authority slashed its base lending rate by 50 points on March 4 in lockstep with an emergency cut in the cost of money by the US Federal Reserve.
