Sunday, May 18, 2014

What happens if sellers refuse to lower their prices?

Vietnam's housing bubble is an especially over inflated. Average prices to average incomes are at a 25x multiple. 25! In contrast the median multiple (not exactly the same measure, but similar) in Vancouver is 10x. Sellers have not lowered their prices in the face of plummeting demand. Since 2010 they have been stubborn. The result? A Frozen Market. No thaw expected in Vietnam's frozen housing market
Dang Hung Vo said a paradox in the property market is that supply of high-cost housing units has overwhelmed demand, leading to high inventories and bad debts, while there is a severe lack of low-cost housing units. Only 1,500 condominiums were sold in Hanoi in the first quarter, according to property firm CBRE. While that’s a five-fold increase from the 279 sold in the same period two years ago, it’s still down from the peak in 2009, when more than 15,000 units were sold in the capital city.

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