Property prices in the Philippines continued to remain stable even amid the COVID-19 pandemic largely due to the government’s aggressive infrastructure programs.
“Many may not realize it, but property prices in the Philippines have remained stable despite the covid crisis, unlike those in other Southeast Asian countries,” said Dr. Reghis M. Romero II, president of the Philippine chapter of the Paris-based International Real Estate Federation (FIABCI).
Romero said the government’s Build, Build, Build program buoyed property prices nationwide even as other countries in the region experienced a downtrend due to the pandemic, citing a FIABCI survey worldwide.
“The survey showed the Philippines’ house prices rising by 1.8% in 2019 to 2020 and 5.6% in 2021 compared with price declines of -0.3% and -0.4% in Cambodia during both periods respectively, -10.2% and -1.1% in Indonesia, -5.3% and -2.9%% in Thailand, -7.5% and -10% in Laos, and -5.7% and -6.6% in Malaysia,” Dr. Romero II said.
Real estate value on uptick
Romero said the stable property property can be attributed largely to the government’s program for infrastructure “which drives the value of real estate in benefited areas across the archipelago, facilitates logistical flows, and boosts the efficiency of the industry’s supply chains.”
Romero referred to the 2021 full-year budget of P695.7 billion for public works and highways.
“Nonetheless, there has been an occupancy dip in the rental and lease market involving urban retail and office spaces because of last-mile distribution (door-to-door deliveries) and work-from-home arrangements made possible by technological advances in communications, which keep people in the loop even without physical presence,” he said.
“ Still, this WFH arrangement gives property developers the option and opportunity to tap cheaper lands outside the CBDs (central business districts) for various projects,” Romero said of the emerging business prospects for FIABCI members.
FIABCI as networking platform
The current state of the real estate industry is the focus of the global conference and excellence awards that will be staged by FIABCI’s Philippine chapter at the Okada Hotel Manila on December 9, when the metropolis is projected to attain herd immunity.
FIABCI-Ph chairman Architect Nestor S. Mangio said the conference serves as a networking platform for the global value chain, thus providing opportunities for our local players to gain international exposure and clinch dollar-generating foreign supply contracts, joint ventures, marketing tie-ups, and technological partnerships and other lucrative collaborations.
“On the other hand, the Excellence Awards portrays the Philippines as a worthy, if not preferred, property investment destination, thus opening up doors for foreign capital inflows while sustaining local monetary infusion from the private sector,” Mangio said.
The Excellence Awards have 16 categories – environmental (rehabilitation or conservation), heritage (restoration), master plan, hotel, convention, industrial, office, public infrastructure/amenities, high-rise and low-rise residential, resort, retail, rural, specialized, and sustainable development, with several of them having regional winners.
Likewise, the FIABCI-Ph will honor exemplary individuals in the professional and education sectors for their outstanding performance and contributions to the growth of the real estate industry.
Models of the industry
“The honorees will be conferred ‘Fellow in Real Estate Management’, a distinction that will set them apart as models of the industry in their respective fields of specialization and whose expert opinions will be much sought after and highly regarded even by their own peers,” said FIABCI-Ph vice chairman Dr. Eduardo G. Ong, also vice president of FIABCI-World for education and training.
Ong said the conferment of such distinction was conceptualized and implemented by the Philippine Council of Real Estate Educators (Philcore) in 1996 and continued by FIABCI-Ph starting in 2015 during its 1st Property and Real Estate Excellence Awards held on April 17 of that year.”
Since 2015, there have been 33 recipients of such distinction, with the Excellence Awards posting a total of 61 Outstanding Developer awardees, three Property Man of the Year awardees, and two Developer of the Year awardees.