*More units come on line; marginal fall in rents
*Marginal drop in rents in some Qatar areas recorded
A mix of 1,700 apartments and villas were added in Qatar in the second quarter (Q2) of this year, bringing the total stock to 294,700 units as of June-end, according to research and consultancy firm ValuStrat.
Apartment supply consisted of some 1,500 units from delivered projects in The Pearl, Lusail, Fereej Bin Mahmoud, Old Ghanim, Fereej Abdul Aziz, Musheireb and Al Dafna.
Completion of villas and compounds in Al Kheesa, Al Wajba, Umm Salal Ali and The Pearl added 200 new properties to existing stock, it said.
An estimated 9,000 units are projected to be completed by end-2019, with 35% expected in Lusail, 35% in The Pearl and the remaining units across other areas such as Fereej Bin Mahmoud, Nuaija, Musheireb, Onaiza, Al Dafna, Al Sadd, Ain Khaled, Al Khor and Abu Hamour, ValuStrat said.
In terms of residential sales, the ValuStrat report showed that median transacted ticket sizes for houses increased by 12% quarterly and 3% annually.
QoQ increase in median transacted prices can be attributed to larger ticket sizes of housing transactions experienced in areas such as Al Kharaitiyat, Al Markhiya, Lusail, Abu Hamour, Madinat Al Khalifa and Rawdhat Al Hamama.
Transactional volumes for houses declined 25% quarter-on-quarter (QoQ) and 14% year-on-year (YoY). The median ticket size for residential houses was QR2.8mn.
The five largest ticket sizes were seen in The Pearl, New Salata, Lusail and Abu Hamour for dwellings ranging from 1,400 sq m to 5,500 sq m.
As many as 53 transactions were recorded for residential buildings. Rawdhat Al Khail, Al Sadd, Najma, Al Wakrah and Muaither had the largest transacted prices.
As of May 2019, transactional volume in The Pearl and West Bay Lagoon was 274 units with a total value of QR612mn.
Residential median asking rents declined 5.6% YoY and 1.5% QoQ, ValuStrat said.
Median monthly asking rent for apartments fell 1.1% quarterly and 5.4% annually, it said.
Secondary apartment locations such as Al Wakrah, Old Airport, Najma and Al Mansoura experienced highest annual declines in rents of up to 13%.
Median monthly asking rent for villas fell by 4% QoQ and 7.1% YoY.
Villas in Muraikh, Al Gharrafa, Ain Khaled, Abu Hamour, Al Khor and Umm Salal Mohammad experienced annual falls in rent up to 12%, ValuStrat said.
The second quarter 2019 ValuStrat Price Index (VPI)-Residential, displayed an overall 6.3% annual and 0.8% quarterly decline in capital values.
Villa and freehold apartment prices saw marginal QoQ declines of 0.8% and 0.4% respectively.
Amongst freehold apartments, West Bay Lagoon witnessed the highest overall decline in values followed by Lusail and The Pearl. All villa locations experienced marginal declines against the previous quarter.
A quarterly capital depreciation between 1% to 3% was observed in clusters of Ain Khaled/Abu Hamour, Old Airport/Najma, Al Wakrah and Al Khor.
The remaining clusters experienced quarterly capital depreciation of less than 1%. Gross yields for residential units averaged at an overall 5% adjusted to 6% for apartments and 4.5% for villas, ValuStrat said.
