No Chinese slow-down on commercial property

Chinese investment in Australian commercial property will continue unabated for some time, an expert says.

Australia was the destination for more than a quarter of the $5.65 billion that Chinese investors ploughed into commercial real estate globally in the first quarter of 2015, up from 15% in 2014.

CBRE head of research Stephen McNabb told the ABC that Australia’s attractive economic conditions made it the prime candidate for further Asian investment, and that the money would continue pouring in.

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“I don’t see anything to change that,” McNabb says.

“It will grow and we’ve seen very strong growth rates in the last five to six years.”

Chinese investors are also buying up some of Australia’s biggest farming operations

A Colliers International report last month revealed Sydney is now the third most popular city worldwide for commercial property, ranking behind only London and Manhattan for offshore investment.

McNabb says foreign investment will continue even as other countries recover from their current economic downturn.

“If anything I see that (investment) might slow down as the rest of the world improves, but I don’t see that going into reverse.”

“We’d expect that it would narrow over time, but that doesn’t mean the capital goes the other way, that just means we’ll see a slowing in the inflow of what is a large and growing pool of capital looking for real estate investment.”