Property transactions in the nation’s six special municipalities rose 15 percent last month to 17,775 units from 14,940 units a year earlier, real-estate brokers said.

“The improvement lent support to a confidence recovery after owners agreed to lower prices to facilitate deals,” Sinyi Realty Inc (信義房屋) researcher Tseng Ching-der (曾進德) said in a report on Monday.

New Taipei City led the comeback in the north with 4,279 transactions, a 15.4 percent gain year-on-year, municipal government data showed.

Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房屋) spokesman Jay Hsieh (謝志傑) said the completion of work on presale residential projects in Banciao (板橋) and Sinjhuang (新莊) districts bolstered trading.

PRICE CUTS EXPECTED

Regardless, price decline expectations remain strong among buyers, and sellers are going to have to soften to attract buyers with real demand, since investors have almost all fled the market, Hsieh said.

Transactions in Taipei stood at 1,948 units, up 2.8 percent from a year earlier, the city government said, adding that most deals were concentrated in Zhongshan (中山) and Neihu (內湖) districts.

Unaffordability has limited transactions in the capital, Hsieh said.

Taoyuan saw property transactions grow 15.6 percent from a year earlier, as it continued to benefit from launches of presale projects a few years back to take advantage of its administrative upgrade, Hsieh said.

Infrastructure facility enhancement and relatively affordable prices helped spur demand, he added.

SOUTHERN BOOM

Similar reasons underpinned property markets in the center and south of the nation.

Transactions rose 21.8 percent year-on-year to 3,280 units in Taichung while jumping 23.6 percent to 1,573 units in Tainan and by 19.8 percent to 2,558 units in Kaohsiung, official data showed.

Taiwan Realty Co (台灣房屋) said property demand held resilient in southern Taiwan, thanks to self-occupancy needs and a relatively low base compared with northern Taiwan.

Last month’s showing translated into a 3 percent decline from the previous month’s transactions, weighed down by Ghost Month taboos about making big purchases, relocating or getting married, although its effect is obviously on the decline, brokers said.

Ghost Month this year began on Aug. 22 and ended on Sept. 19.