Manila overtook Dubai as the fastest-appreciating luxury real estate market last year, according to the residential installment of Knight Frank’s Wealth Report, released Wednesday.
The capital of the Philippines, considered the most densely populated city in the world, recorded annual price gains of 26.3% across its high-end market in 2023, the most of any of the 100 markets analyzed by the real estate firm and property consultant.
With price growth of 16%, Dubai, which ranked No. 1 in the prior edition of the report, slipped to second place; and the Bahamas, having logged price gains of 15% last year, came in third place. The Algarve, in Portugal, and Cape Town, South Africa, both of which saw prices jump 12.3%, rounded out the top five.
Overall, luxury residential markets proved resilient last year, despite successive interest rate hikes and a rising cost of living around the world.
“At the start of 2023, economists were expecting a much weaker outcome across global residential property markets,” Kate Everett-Allen, head of international residential and country research at Knight Frank, said in the report.
“Stock markets were heading for more pain, inflation was veering out of control, and the pandemic-fuelled property boom was set to end in tears as borrowing costs hit 15-year highs in some markets,” she said. “However, that never happened—we’ve seen a much softer landing in terms of price performance around the world.”
Across all of the 100 markets tracked by Knight Frank, 80 recorded flat or positive annual price growth, and overall luxury prices climbed 3.1% on average in 2023, “a solid gain overall,” according to the report.
The Asia-Pacific region was the most prosperous, with luxury prices up 3.8% annually, besting the Americas, where luxury home prices were up 3.6%.
Source: https://www.barrons.com