1. Property market depends on econmy situation, if economy will be robust in the next 5 years then demand for property will be good and vice versa. So need to look at the economy situation to determine. If said next 5 years will be good because of cycle without good reason backing then it is purely speculation.

There is some modest correlation between oil price, inflation which affected the property market.
If taking aside the demand issue due to economy, high oil price will mean push up the inflation in all channel, steel price goes up, cement price goes up as well as all other building materials mean that developers need to raise their price which generally make the market price higher.
But in the real world, it is much more complex, high oil price and inflation generally will mean higher interest rate imposed by central banks making loan more expensive and lesser demand on property. Also high inflation mean consumer has less ability to buy property also high oil price always associated will economy slow down -> less demand.

So it has 2 way to affect the property sector which one is on the upside, one is on the downside. So how it (oil price and inflation) willl affect the property market, you need to see which factor has the largest effect.

This post has been edited by cherroy: Oct 28 2007, 11:34 AM

The Fed might have another 0.25% cut in the bag as housing slump continue and financial market credit crunch issue is far from stable. But with inflation is still a threat, I don't think Fed will cut it too low unless economy run into recession. If they really cut it too low, then it will send the USD to more fresh low and if USD did drop non-stop, if would create more uncertainty in global market as most of the trade and asset held is in USD denomination.
But over long term, there are some arguement that you don't cure the problem at all at the root with the rate cut, you just delay it, as inflation might haunt later on. This issue still debatable, only time will tell.

Back to local issue, BNM has no choice at all, by right, wtih high inflation currently, BNM needs to hike the interest rate to cool down the demand, but current domestic demand is not so strong, they don't want to risk it as it mean economy will be easily put into break with the hike. They rather take the risk of inflation rather than causing economy to slow down. We just come out the the 1997 recession and recover, they don't want out economy back to slow mode again which might mean a lot of problem domestically. Also, there is massive liquidity in the local banking system which means klibor rate will stay at low end for the near time.
Also, the recent inflation is not because of domestic demand driven but the root of raw material which is much harder to tackle.

With high inflation is coming and raw materials price surging, it is a bit high risk to buy those under-con with less reputable developers. When the raw materials price outshooting their cost, project will have high chance of being delayed and abandoned especially those bad track record developers. Our law is simply not protective enough for the buyers.

This post has been edited by cherroy: Oct 28 2007, 04:28 PM

If it is 0.5% then USD will be slaughter in the forex market.
Then oil price will probably shoot up again.
Foreigners holding US assets will feel the pain if USD keep on its bearish mood. US Dollar Index has dropping to fresh low recently, around 77.+ only.

Let see how it make up on Wednesday, Fed move is difficult to judged at the moment.

Cheers.