Housing Market Demand Cools: Presale Unsold Inventory Outside Taiwan's Seven Major Cities Tops 1,000 Units in Changhua

As market demand cools, the presale housing market is beginning to face digestion pressure. A real estate brokerage, based on actual transaction registration data, analyzed the sales performance of presale residential projects across 10 counties and cities outside Taiwan’s seven major metropolitan areas. The results show that Miaoli County and Keelung City achieved sales rates exceeding 70%, leading the rankings, while Changhua County’s unsold inventory surpassed 1,000 units.

Evergreen Real Estate pointed out that this phenomenon indicates that after the housing market boom subsides, the presale market is gradually returning to fundamental tests such as population, industry, and employment. Owner-occupier demand and price competitiveness have become key factors.

In terms of presale project sales performance, Miaoli County and Keelung City ranked first and second with sales rates of 71.2% and 70.5%, respectively. Chen Jinping, Deputy Manager of Evergreen’s Research and Development Center, noted that Miaoli benefits from the mature development of the Zhunan-Toufen tech industry cluster and the spillover effect of high housing prices in Hsinchu, continuously attracting tech-sector workers and owner-occupier buyers. As a result, despite a large project scale, the market maintains strong absorption capacity.

As for Keelung City, it has recently benefited from the Keelung Metro development plans and its more competitive housing prices compared to Taipei and New Taipei. This has attracted commuters and first-time homebuyers. Coupled with convenient access to Taipei City, Keelung has drawn some residents spilling over from the high-priced Taipei–New Taipei area, making it a relocation option for certain homebuyers.

Looking further at sales rates, Nantou County and Hualien County recorded only 35.7% and 40.9%, respectively, ranking at the lower end of the survey. Chen Jinping stated that Nantou lacks large-scale industrial parks and major employment hubs, making it difficult to attract working populations. Housing demand mainly relies on local owner-occupiers, limiting overall growth. Thus, when market demand cools, project sales performance is easily affected.

Regarding Hualien County, Chen noted that slow regional industrial development and limited job opportunities constrain population growth momentum. The workforce continues to migrate to other metropolitan areas. Additionally, Hualien frequently experiences natural disasters such as earthquakes and typhoons, leading some residents to adopt a more cautious home-buying attitude, increasing market观望 (wait-and-see) sentiment. With limited new demand, project sales performance remains weak.

In terms of remaining unsold units, Changhua County leads among the 10 counties and cities with 1,115 units. Chen Jinping explained that Changhua has recently benefited from the Greater Taichung living circle, the Central Taiwan Science Park Erlin园区, and various major construction projects, attracting developers to actively launch new projects, causing supply to grow rapidly. However, the Erlin Science Park has not yet completed full recruitment, and key leading companies have not confirmed their entry. Coupled with ongoing population outflow, industrial development and population effects remain limited. Local investment and property acquisition demand remain low, and housing demand is primarily from local owner-occupiers. The relatively limited market size means new project absorption cannot keep pace with supply growth, further increasing unsold inventory.

Chen emphasized that while past major construction projects and industrial benefits often drove developers to launch projects aggressively, after market enthusiasm cools, the real drivers of sales performance are population growth, employment opportunities, and industrial development. Regions with stable population inflow and industrial clusters will be more likely to maintain sales momentum. Conversely, if demand does not grow significantly, pressure on unsold inventory sales is likely to continue rising.