Hong Kong home prices drop 15.6% in 2022, snap 13 years of gain

(Reuters) – Private home prices in Hong Kong, one of the most unaffordable territories in the world, fell 15.6% in 2022 in the first annual drop since 2008, official data showed on Friday.

Prices in the Asian financial hub were weighed down by a weak economic outlook and rising mortgage costs, following a COVID-19 outbreak at the beginning of the year.

December saw the seventh consecutive month of decline, the data showed, with prices down 2.0% from a month earlier to the lowest since April 2017. That compared with a revised 3.2% drop in November and a 2.6% fall in October.

For 2023, real estate consultancies expect home prices to remain soft though stabilise in the second half after an expected peak in interest rates.

(Reporting by Donny Kwok; Editing by Christopher Cushing)