Survey: Pinoys still prefer house and lots over condos

CEBU, Philippines - While condo living is already gaining ground in the Philippines in recent years, a survey however revealed that majority of Filipinos still prefer to purchase house and lot packages.

The latest survey results released yesterday by online property portal Lamudi Philippines, revealed that 94.86 percent of its respondents are looking for house and lot properties, while 2.42 percent prefer condominiums, and the remaining 1.21 percent are  looking for townhouses.

 However, condos were the most searched among website users looking for rental properties, "while houses were preferred by those looking for property for sale," the survey stated.

Cebu is the second most cited area (next to Manila) for those looking for a property (6.97 percent),  followed by the Province of Cavite (6.73 percent). These provinces according to the survey, however, are home to highly populated and popular cities for homebuyers, including Cebu City, Lapu-Lapu, and Mandaue (Cebu Province) and Bacoor, Imus, and Dasmariñas (Cavite).

The survey also showed that 79.57 percent of the respondents cited the internet as their starting point when searching for a property.

"They cited real estate websites, search engines, and social media websites as their starting points when searching for property."

Lamudi used the survey data from its second quarter 2014 to first quarter 2015 onsite search, the results of 2015 survey involving real estate professionals and its website’s users, and listings data.

Real estate professional are equally optimistic about the industry. The survey indicated that practitioners noted that the strict bank requirements on housing loans have not even made a dent on the growth of the housing market.

Moreover, 51 percent  and 53 percent of them said that political climate and economic uncertainty will have minimal effect on the housing market.

 The survey further showed that 59 percent  of the professional respondents cited online listings platform as their most widely used online channel to promote their property listings.

According to Investopedia, a prospective homeowner can afford to mortgage a home that costs approximately 2.5 times his gross annual income.

If a person makes P50,000 per month (P600,000 per year), he can afford a property that costs P1.5 million.

 In Cebu, most developers already announced their plans to invest into economic housing projects this year, aside from expanding their condominium portfolios.  (FREEMAN)