New condo prices in Tokyo area up 6.9% n FY 2017

April 17, 2018

Tokyo- The average unit price of new condominiums put up for sale in Tokyo and three neighboring prefectures in fiscal 2017 rose 6.9 percent from the previous year to 59.21 million yen, up for the first time in two years, a private think tank said Monday.

The average price was the second highest since comparable data became available in fiscal 1990, when the figure stood at a record 62.14 million yen, according to the Real Estate Economic Institute.

The rise came mainly because the average price of newly launched condominiums in the 23 wards of Tokyo went up 3.6 percent to 70.08 million yen, officials of the institute said.

The average price jumped 12.5 percent to 56.61 million yen in Kanagawa Prefecture, south of the Japanese capital, reflecting an increase in the number of expensive condominiums built near train stations.

The other two prefectures covered by the data are Saitama and Chiba.

In the year that ended in March, the total number of new condominiums launched in the greater Tokyo area grew 1.1 percent to 36,837 units, marking the first growth since fiscal 2013, when demand surged ahead of the consumption tax rate hike to 8 percent from 5 percent in April 2014.

Supply increased 9.8 percent to 16,393 units in the 23 Tokyo wards.

Of the total supply in the greater Tokyo area, the proportion of condominiums for which sales contracts were concluded within the first month of launch came to 68.8 percent, up 0.3 percentage point from fiscal 2016. But the rate stood below the boom-or-bust dividing line of 70 percent for the second consecutive year.

The rate was above 70 percent in the 23 Tokyo wards and Kanagawa, but below 60 percent in the other parts of the capital and Saitama. Jiji Press