Latin America, Middle East & Africa Property Markets Fair Better

In the recent Global Commercial Property Survey from RICS, there has been a notable downward trend in both investment and rental growth.

Declining revenues have been observed in all markets though notably in the US. This weaker commercial environment is also being observed in Developing Asia and interestingly for the first time in Emerging Europe with both India and Russia seeing sharp declines in real estate activity.

Although Latin America, the Middle East and Africa are fairing better, these regions are still experiencing the effect of the global credit crunch.

“The deterioration in the global economy is now clearly visible in both investment and tenant demand for commercial property. No longer is the weakness confined to the developed world. Indeed, the near term outlook is for the picture to worsen with the U.S. close to the bottom of the league. Despite the aggressive response from the Federal Reserve, rents and Capital values in the U.S. are set to fall further,” said Simon Rubinsohn, senior economist, RICS.

“With property prices declining, this is the time to invest and pick up a bargain, says Chintan Mahida from Nubricks.com, the UK’s leading Overseas Property Blog, this is especially true with strong investment opportunities in emerging property markets such as Asia and Eastern Europe.”

There is light at the end of the tunnel with recent activity from LaSalle investment indicating investor interest in Asian property, in particular Australia, Hong Kong, China, Singapore and Japan. Despite an overall decline in prices, there is the perception that property is being sold at below market value. Many european investors are looking to Asia to diversify their investment portfolio.

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