Real estate prices rising strongly

Just as a Follow On here, I Learned this morning about 1 hour ago) that the neighbour who will have to move his CR did not have permission to Build (Subdivision with Rules) to get around this he Built on the back where it could not be seen (He thought) what he never took into account was that the Area he built on was actually 2 feet onto the Barangay Road in Question. The rear of this subdivision (in Parts) backs on to this Particular Barangay Road. So here we have yet another reason for shrinking Roads and "Rights of Way " The City Engineer has been and told the Guy "Move the Wall"
If people just followed the rules, things like this would not happen & we could all get along together and live some sort of Normal? life But.................

 

It is not so easy to gather representative information about the housing market. Statistical information is sparse and heavily influenced by developments in the NCR, and based on new loans reporting by banks rather than actual transactions in the housing market.
For a small local market like the Dumaguete area I cannot find any statistics. That means that unless I didn't search well enough, most opinions about the market are based on anecdotal evidence at best, and on rumours at worst.
That said, my impression of the local property market is that there are several factors that play a decisive role:
1. Rents in Dumaguete are high, relative to the actual value of properties. As long as this situation persists, property owners have an incentive to rent out rather than sell as long as they can afford to stay invested.
2. Some properties are said to be for sale, but the asking price (through the roof) does not reflect any eagerness to find a buyer. Either the owner lives on another planet or they are looking to find a fool, so imho these asking prices are a poor reflection of "the market".
3. I see estimates of between 5000 and 7000 expats living in the Dumaguete area, and for what that number is worth, that seems to me a major impact on both the rentals and selling side of the real estate market, especially in the "4 million and up segment". Moreover, the "promotion boom" for living in Dumaguete is still going strong ( see this recent article 10 Reasons to visit or live in Dumaguete, the Philippines | HuffPost )
4. Fast economic growth in the Philippines definitely influences the real estate market as a whole, but one can question the relevance of the national numbers for our province. Negros Oriental remains one of the poorest in the country, with a poverty incidence of around 50% and agriculture with its low productivity still a major part of economic activity.

I would conclude that while the long term outlook for the property market looks pretty solid, one should be careful when looking to buy a lot / house and lot. If you fall victim to one of the rather staggering instances of mispricing, and pay way too much, then even a solid market won't help the "under water" value of your investment for a long long time.
And to kick in the old open door, make sure you know the law with regard to what you can and cannot own as an expat in this country.

 

Someone I know told me the building costs of a smaller (about 60 to 80 sqm) two floor high quality high standard bungalow. It was between 1.5 and 2 Mio PHP. Add to these a lot of 200 sqm costing 2000 PHP/sqm and we have a sum between 1.9 and 2.4 Mio PHP. There was somewhere listed that a good standard house construction costs around 20000 and 27000 PHP/sqm all incl. That means that a good 100 sqm house would costs up to 2.7 Mio PHP. With a 200 sqm lot it woll costs completely up to 3.1 Mio PHP. And houses are degrading also making them being normally less value. But the real estate market is crazy. Even for utter crap are the buyers spending fortunes just to have own house. Most houses on the real estate market on the Philippines have not the value the seller are asking for. A special case are condos. The construction price for these are even more lower per sqm than the one for a house. This counts also for the maintenance cost per unit. But still are condos being sold with a much higher price per sqm than a house. Why should I pay 5 Mio PHP for a medicore condo if I could have a nice bigger house and lot for the same price?

Edit: Check the kitchen and the bath rooms and CRs to get a hint how high the standard of the house is. More than one CR/bath will increase the sqm construction price somewhat. A low standard house and lot should never exceed 1.5 Mio PHP. (Except the lot is really big.) The location can modify the prices. But it should never be more than 20% above the estimated construction and lot price for a similar object in a less well location.

 

You shouldn't, my house of 140 meters on 500 meters of land cost us about 4.2 mil valued not long ago at 5.3 to sell ( We are not but just wanted to know) and of course we have no Dues to pay

 

Construction cost for your house up to 3,780,000 PHP and lot 500,000 PHP (1000 PHP/sqm) will indeed give around 4.28 Mio PHP. Seems to be a fair price for which you have paid that house and lot. I saw much smaller house and lots for higher prices.

 

If anyone is going to go from Scratch you can ride the event but anyone not savvy with the PI, you may well be taken in by the cosmetic Look but soon find the corners taken but full cost attracted

 

This has been discussed in another thread recently, but IMHO ... don't buy. From problems of ownership, inheritance, neighbours, encroachment, changes to government rules on foreigners, maintenance, insurance (and payouts) for 'natural disasters' in a natural-disaster prone country, lack of flexibility .... I think MOST ex-pats should rent.

 

Unless the Barangay Captain is the encroacher or is a relative of the encroacher.