Is There A Real Estate Bubble In Hong Kong That's About To Burst?

Chinese real estate developers are having some of their worst 12-month periods on record this year, defaulting on billions of debt as they face the new reality of much slower home sales in mainland China.

China’s non-financial debt-to-GDP that comprises in large part retail borrowing on properties has surged since the country’s boom days, from 132% in 2007 to 285% this year. Property comprises around a third of China’s GDP and around 65% of all household assets in China.

So a dwindling real estate market has put pressure on the country’s growth, where the World Bank recently cut its forecast from 4.8% to just 4.4% in 2024.

Plunging Home Prices, Empty Office Space

In Hong Kong, the situation is potentially even more precarious than it is in neighboring China. The number of people applying for greater than 80% mortgages in Hong Kong has risen sharply this year by over a third, even as properties are going for massive discounts to what they did in prior years’ sales.  

Property prices in the world’s least affordable housing market plunged 16% in 2022 and have been dropping further throughout this year. Residential housing prices fell a further 10% in the first half of 2023, while larger apartments over 1,700 square feet in size dropped as much as 22% in value according to data from Ratings & Valuation Department.

Sales volumes are still well over 40% below what they were 18 months ago, according to the department, and in some cases up to 70% lower than before.

Despite these declines, the island still remains the world’s least affordable to buy or rent property in, according to a recent survey by Demographia. That suggests that unless the economy rebounds sharply, property prices have further to fall.

Among commercial real estate developers, headwinds appear even stronger still: vacancy rates for office rentals are hitting all-time highs of 16%, with rents off 5% so far in 2023.

The Midland Price Index, a volume weighted index of the average prices of Hong Kong properties compiled by Midland Realty Limited, has been steadily declining throughout the year. In October, it is 2.2% lower than the month before, while Midland’s Confidence Index for the property market also hit a new low this month for 2023.

The lacking demand for office space on the island this week prompted the Hong Kong government to pause on its commercial real estate auctions, which typically provides the local government with funds for expansion.

Developer Woes Point To Bubble Bursting

All of this raises the possibility of there being a property bubble in Hong Kong that’s soon about to burst. Part of the problem, according to Knight Frank Limited, a property agent, is the huge amount of debt that Hong Kong real estate purchasers are assuming when they buy. That’s not likely to help a decline that won’t seem to abate.

“Under the current market headwinds, sell-offs are set to endure amid weakening purchasing power,” wrote analysts at Knight Frank in a recent note.

Hong Kong’s biggest listed real estate developers are down sharply on the year as rising defaults, tighter credit conditions and weaker-than-expected economic prospects in China maul their financial statements.

Country Garden Holdings Limited CTRYY is off 67% this year, while China Evergrande Group EGRNF is 80% lower, returning from a trading suspension in August after 17 months due to legal and financial woes.

The contagion has rattled local banks, with China Construction Bank Corporation CICHY 11% lower year-to-date and Bank of China Limited BACHY 5% weaker over the same period. Local lender HSBC Holdings plc HSBC is higher by 27% for the year as a result of undertaking billions in stock repurchases but is still trading 6% lower than it was 5 years ago.

Market Intervention Hazards

The increasingly troubled sector has brought about a sharp sell-off in all Hong Kong stocks this year, not just in developer stocks and banks, as the unknown extent of defaults continue to weigh on investors’ minds. Year-to-date, the Hang Seng Index is down over 15%.

That has caused some to speculating that the Chinese government will step in with a bail-out for property developers, similar to the way the US government bailed out automakers such as Ford Motor Co F and General Motors Co GM as well as giant financial institutions Morgan Stanley MS, The Goldman Sachs Group Inc. GS, Bank of America Corp. BAC and JP Morgan Chase & Co JPM in the 2008 subprime crisis.

Hong Kong’s local government has already tried to work in a range of stimulus policies to revive its beleaguered property market. These include everything from introducing tax credits for buyers to tightening up available supply and even inducing Chinese companies to invest billions of dollars in an IT Hub on a patch of agrarian farmland that lies between Hong Kong and China in a zone known as the New Territories.

But in China’s complex economy, it’s not as easy as just pumping in money, the more so in Hong Kong, which has an international component to its real estate scene, maintain market watchers. Market intervention tactics by local government, while stabilizing things a bit, ultimately only made matters messier last year in neighboring China.

The extent of China’s overblown real estate prices was muddied by financing from local government financing vehicles (LGFVs), a way for banks and governments to game the real estate market and other asset prices.

LGFVs accounted for over half of land purchases in 2022 vs. just 33% the year before and 17% in 2021, according to data from Rhodium Group. That created a false sense of demand, ultimately crashing prices in areas faster than they would have otherwise fallen.

Rhodium says the LGFV purchasing interventions only made matters worse as government-subsidized property buyers came to form a bedrock of artificial value below much of China’s land values in 2022.

Ultimately, these interventions caught up with developers when the music stopped in 2022 and early this year, resulting in huge debt defaults such as Evergrande’s missed repayments of $30 billion in offshore bonds. China’s Ministry of Finance eventually issued a notice for local governments to stop intervening in their property markets using LGFVs.

Further, government stimulus only seems to be showing up how weak the Hong Kong property market actually is. This month, Hong Kong’s local government is set to auction off just one property, meaning it will end up meeting a maximum of 20% of its targeted auction revenue for the year.

The recent auctions provide a guage of the extent of discounts local developers are demanding to develop new land in Hong Kong.

Sun Hung Kai Properties Ltd. SUHJY recently won a HK$20 billion Kowloon property for just HK$4.6 billion at a recent auction while consortium of property developers led by Sino Land Company Limited SNLAY last month won another auction for a property in Kai Tak for a 10% discount, paying just HK$5.3 billion for over 100,000 sq ft of prime Hong Kong development space.