A four-bedroom house that sits on 16,330 square-feet of land, with a swimming pool, a parking lot for two cars, and some 1990's home décor is being sold in Hong Kong for HK$3.5 billion or $446 million.
With these seemingly lackluster home features, the house, when sold, could be the most expensive property purchase in Hong Kong or probably the world, Bloomberg noted.
In comparison, the Villa Les Cedres, an 18,000-square-foot 188-year-old mansion with 14 bedrooms, was listed in 2017 for $409 million. The property is located in the south of France, in Saint Jean Cap Ferrat which is sandwiched between Nice and Monaco.
The mansion was once home to King Leopold II of Belgium and was built in 1830. It has a ballroom, a chapel, a winter garden, and a 50-meter swimming pool built into the rocks. It also has stable for 30 horses and 35 acres of lawns and flower gardens. The house is overlooking the breath-taking view of the blue waters of the Mediterranean Sea.
The mansion's library has about 3,000 books on topics ranging from flora and naturalism. The book collection includes a 17th-century digest focused entirely on botany.
The four-bedroom home in Hong Kong could only boast about its address: the PeakRoad neighborhood at 24 Middle Gap Road which is said to be the most sought-after enclaves among the city's most affluent market.
The prospective buyer of the Hong Kong home could be just after the land more than the house itself, according to Lawrence Brown. He is a senior consultant at Executive Homes Hong Kong Ltd. Whoever who is going to pay that much for the house may probably just demolish the house and build a new one, Brown added.
But then again, Cap Ferrat where the Villa Les Cedres mansion is located is also the most expensive area in France. Among tycoons and billionaires who purchased property in the neighborhood include Paul Allen, the co-founder of Microsoft, and Boris Berezovsky, a Russian oligarch.
In 2016, buyers who eyed Hong Kong's PeakRoad property would have paid an average of $114,000 per square meter while those who bought in Cap Ferrat would have paid $67,000 per square meter.
The pricing of the four-bedroom home currently on sale in the market indicates that Hong Kong remains one of the world's least-affordable property markets despite efforts by the government to curb its skyrocketing prices.
Brown said that the housing market in Hong Kong has been showing signs of cooling down at present. Still, if the four-bedroom house is sold with its current pricing, then this only goes to show that Hong Kong's top-tiered market remain inclined about buying expensive properties.
The purchase would suggest that Hong Kong's luxury sector is not affected by the supposed economic downturn said to be widespread across economies in the Asian region.
