Market Outlook

Strata Office Market outlook

•  In 2021, the strata office market together with the larger office sector in Singapore is expected to remain under pressure, with companies critically reviewing the way space is occupied in the post-pandemic era characterised by evolving remote work protocols. Therefore, transaction volumes as well as prices are likely to remain subdued for at least the first six months of the year.
• Nevertheless, as office users rationalise and right-size their space requirements, occupiers such as small enterprises may turn towards owner-occupied strata offices as a viable alternative to tenanted space. As such demand for strata offices, especially those in central locations, could improve in the second half of 2021.

Strata Retail Market outlook

• Moving forward, the global economic outlook remains uncertain with recurring infections in other nations despite the distribution of the vaccines. And even if vaccine distribution proves to be successful, prices of strata retail units in Singapore are envisaged to remain soft with more distressed sales expected due to the lack of tourists and safe distancing measures still in place.
• The demand for such strata spaces is expected to come from proprietors that intend to run their own businesses, preferring to set up shop in locations where strata retail developments tend to be typically located. Often the lower costs when compared to renting retail space in a prime shopping mall in the same location act as the greatest incentive.
• Thus, with the retail market gravitating towards more experiential placemaking strategies and migrating some of their services to digital platforms, there is a growing imperative for strata retail storeowners to also adopt similar ways to survive in a market that is in constant change.

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2020 was a challenging year for Philippine real estate and the global property market, but we see the new year as a promising time for sectors such as industrial & logistics, office, residential, REITs, and data centers, among others. The industrial & logistics sector was the most stable asset class in the past year, and there are huge opportunities in the e-commerce and the rollout of COVID-19 vaccines. The office sector is likely to perform better than 2020, while we anticipate residential real estate to exhibit a slow but gradual rebound.

In 2021, macrotrends such as the boom of e-commerce, flexible office setups, and continued decentralization outside Metro Manila
are likely to continue and contribute to the property market’s soft recovery.

The Philippine population, which has grown at 1.5% on average each year since 2015, is key to recovery. This growth has created a “demographic sweet spot” and continues to drive consumption and, in particular, the expansion of online retail and the related logistics platforms. The young Philippine population will also continue to keep the country at the forefront of the global BPO industry as outsourcing continues to increase.

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Global Economy

• Global growth estimated to decline by 3.5% in 2020 but expected to rise by 5.5% in 2021
• Advanced economies likely to grow by 4.3% in 2021 on the back of the early rollout of vaccines
• Emerging economies are expected to grow by 6.3% in 2021 on the back of a contracted base

Indian Economy 

• India’s GDP growth for FY21 is estimated to decline by 7.7%, hit by the global pandemic and the lockdown
• Private consumption estimated to contract by 9.5% in FY21 based on income loss, mobility restrictions, and supply constraints
• Government consumption estimated to rise by 5.8% due to increased expenditure as part of pandemic relief packages.
• Investment estimated to decline by 14.5% due to economic uncertainty and delay in implementation of capital projects

Outlook 

• Consumption indicators, including FMCG, auto sales, and GST collection indicate a faster demand recovery in Q3
• Continued momentum post-pandemic in health, pharma, telecom, and technology (e-commerce, fintech, ed-tech, etc.) owing to a significant shift in consumption patterns
• The pandemic has led to a preference for digital services and adoption of digitalisation in many companies
• GDP is estimated to grow at 11% in FY22 owing to robust growth in consumption and investment and lower base effect

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The pandemic has induced behavioural changes amongst consumers that are likely to stay permanent. This has hit the physical retail and F&B sectors hardest and the industry has to be quick to adapt to this new reality in order to nurture the sector back to recovery, albeit in an evolved form.

Footfall numbers will be hard-pressed to return to pre-COVID levels so long as the need to social distance is enforced. The takeaway channel is therefore vital. With incomes falling and unemployment rising, food delivery companies are seeing a decline in activity from the peaks witnessed in the months of April and May. Parents are telling their children now not to order frivolously. Footfall ebbs and flows with some days seeing much greater activity than others (same as our office – some days we have 30% of the workers back while for most of the time, it’s just 15% to 20%). It is difficult to predict the daily flow these days. Whenever helicopter money is disbursed by the government, the crowd emerges in the suburbs. But give it about 10 days and the patronage falls back to pre-payout levels.

The points highlighted above are summarised in the following heatmaps. Table 1A and 1B show the heatmap of revenues by broad tenant types in CBD and Suburban locations. These are the findings obtained after spending weeks soliciting feedback from various retail and F&B operators plus plying the grounds to weed off the weekend-weekday effects.

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