Philippine Property Demand seen to remain strong amid looming U.S. slowdown!
02/01/2008

The demand for property in the Philippines is expected to remain strong even with a looming recession in the United States, real estate consultancy firm C.B. Richard Ellis said on Thursday.

The strong property demand in the Philippines is expected to come from the commercial and office real estate segments.

"We see no end for the demand for commercial real estate," CBRE Philippines chairman Rick Santos told reporters at a news conference.

Santos said that there hasn't been this level of interest since before the Asian financial crisis in 1997.

Manila and other major cities in the Philippines are seeing building booms in office and housing to cater for the large pool of accountants, engineers, architects, and animation professionals that give American firms a lower-cost option.

CBRE sees that there will be over 500,000 square meters of office space in the country ready to accommodate expanding and new business process outsourcing (BPO) offices in 2008.

Some 613,804 square meters (6.6 million square feet) of new commercial space are to be completed this year across Manila, and all are committed to tenants through pre-leasing, the report said.

In a presentation, Santos said the demand for office space remains strong as existing BPO players continue to expand not only in Metro Manila but also in major urban centers nationwide including Metro Cebu.