By Richmond S. Mercurio (The
Philippine Star) | Updated August 5, 2015 - 12:00am
MANILA, Philippines - Filipinos based
in the US are still more inclined on buying houses in the Philippines instead
of condominium units despite the latter’s boom in major cities across the
country, global online property platform Lamudi revealed in its latest report.
Lamudi Philippines said houses remain
the most popular choice among Filipino-American “home-hunters.”
Of the millions of searches conducted
in its website from US-based property hunters during the first half of the
year, Lamudi Philippines said more than half or 57.83 percent of these searches
were for houses while those for condominiums came in second at 16.58 percent.
The company said other most searched
property types were apartments at 8.54 percent and foreclosures at 2.35
percent.
Buying is also more popular among
US-based property hunters as 65.73 percent of all searches were for for-sale
properties, while 34.27 percent were for rental properties, the online property
platform added.
Lamudi Philippines managing director
Jacqueline van den Ende said it latest findings show when it comes to
property-hunting, Filipino-Americans remain traditional in many sense as they
still prefer houses over condos and other property types.
“This I think is akin to the Filipino
mindset that a landed property is a safer and more viable investment vehicle,
as land values rarely stagnate, especially when its location is highly sought
after,” Van den Ende said.
Van den Ende said Filipino-Americans
are a consumer market with formidable size and are the country’s largest
population of overseas Filipinos and biggest source of foreign remittance.
In terms of location, meanwhile,
Lamudi Philippines said the city most Filipino-Americans are searching for is
Quezon City, followed by Makati and Manila.
Lamudi Philippines added that Tagaytay
and Baguio are the fourth and fifth most searched cities among US-based
property-hunters, outranking other popular sites in Metro Manila like Taguig,
Pasig and Mandaluyong.
Lamudi is a global property portal
focusing exclusively on emerging markets, generating about one million visitors
per month.
Lamudi Philippines last May acquired
local counterpart MyProperty.ph to further cement its position as largest
online real estate market in the Philippines.
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