Property 'bad boy' fires the starting gun

Expect bad boys to live up to their reputation.

So, the bad boy of the local property sector tossed another bomb when one of the city's largest developers - CK Asset,controlled by tycoon Li Ka-shing - priced the launch of its Yau Tong project The Coast Line II for an average substantially lower than comparable developments in the area.

The last time the developer took the initiative to stun the market was in March.

At that time, a top executive under the tycoon likened the crash sale of Phase Two of the Grand Jete in Tuen Mun to a "deep water bomb."

Executive director Justin Chiu Kwok-hung knows how to dramatize things. But although a trick can have a dramatic effect the first time it is used, it has less impact if repeated a second time.

Instead of calling The Coast Line II another "deep water bomb" for the market, he called it "ping bao" in the most typical Hong Kong way - it literally means the cheapest of all. No matter what it is called, the various descriptions all mean the same.

Although it is said that history does not repeat itself but it often rhymes, it increasingly looks like that the local property market could be heading for a major correction precipitated by negative expectation resembling that of the last crash about two decades ago.

The discounted prices of The Coast Line II is bound to pile further pressure on both primary and secondary sectors.

When Centaline Property's executive director Louis Chan Wing-kit warned that CK's move would instantly freeze the secondary sector in Kowloon and the New Territories, he was not trying to overstate his concern.

The number of property transactions in the local secondary sector has been low recently, confirming that: one, prices demanded by home owners were above market expectation; and, two, buyers prefer to wait, thinking they may be able to pay less for comparable homes later.

The next thing that both buyers and developers at large are monitoring is whether CK Asset can sell the 132 units quickly.

If it can, other developers may follow suit. If it cannot, the downward pressure will mount.

The bad boy should not be blamed for setting the pace for the market as it is merely reacting to a changing market situation - including an environment of high interest rates that has raised borrowing costs and increased the pressure for developers to clear their large inventories that are building at an uncomfortable rate.

High interest rates increase pressure on both vendors and buyers.

When the US Federal Reserve raised interest rates by a quarter of a percentage point and chairman Jerome Powell spoke to keep the door open to another rate hike next month, hopes began fading that the high interest rate environment would improve in the near future.

Although the bad boy has stopped calling this another "deep water bomb" when Chiu launched The Coast Line II sale in a media-packed event, it is clearly a marketing strategy to clear stocks as quickly as possible.

The Li family has officially fired the starting gun.