Cao Zhen
SHENZHEN S office and retail properties delivered a year of strong rental growth with healthy demand from international and local players, according to the annual report released by Jones Lang LaSalle over the weekend.
Last year, the vacancy rate among the city s top-grade offices was 15.8 percent, 1.9 percent lower than a year ago. The average monthly rent for a grade-A office in Shenzhen rose 21.8 percent to 138.9 yuan (US$21.37) per square meter compared with the previous year.
Jones Lang LaSalle said demand for office building leasing was mainly driven by finance and high-tech firms. With rising rentals in the city s top-grade office properties, buying a whole office building rather than renting it has become a trend because of the long-term value-return potential, said Edward Xia, director of the commercial property department of Jones Lang LaSalle s Shenzhen branch.
The report said last year the price for grade-A office buildings in Shenzhen increased by 30 percent and for the Futian central business district, the city s financial hub, office building average price for the third quarter surpassed 40,000 yuan per square meter.
As the government suspended mortgages for third-home purchases, pledged to speed up trials for residential property taxes, increased interest rates and raised borrowing costs last year, Chinese developers also shifted more investment to commercial properties last year.
According to U.S. real estate service company Cushman and Wakefield Inc. s research, China s commercial real estate investment jumped 42 percent last year from 2009, while transaction volume rose 20 percent.
The vacancy rate among shops last year in Shenzhen dropped 1.7 percent from the previous year. The monthly average rent is 839 yuan per square meter, 8.2 percent up over the same period of last year, Jones Lang LaSalle said. The city s retail sales grew 16.7 percent year on year in the first 11 months of 2010 to 271.7 billion yuan.
