What’s next for Cebu real estate in 2019?

Philippine province to benefit from tourist-friendly infrastructure upgrades throughout the island

Home to the country’s second most populous metropolis, the province of Cebu in the Philippine is set to gain some windfall from the completion of major infrastructure projects, some spanning islands.

The completion of the award-winning Terminal 2 of the Mactan-Cebu International Airport; the Cebu Cordova Expressway Link; Cebu Bus Rapid Transit (BRT); and the Cebu-Negros bridge will behoove property development firms to take “a more aggressive approach in exploring parcels of developable land” in Cebu over the next 12 months, Colliers Philippines prognosticated in a recent report on the archipelagic market.

The city of Mandaue and the island of Mactan off mainland Cebu will see most of the action, especially in the segment of resort-oriented townships.

The nature of the infrastructure projects will spur tourism, increasing demand for more hotels and serviced apartments outside the Metro Cebu corridor.

Colliers expects the completion of 700 new rooms this year, raising Cebu’s hotel stock to 11,300 rooms from 10,600 rooms in 2017.

“We also suggest that developers build more residential projects that are leisure and lifestyle-oriented in anticipation of the increased interest brought about by the infrastructure improvements,” Colliers analysts led by Joey Roi Bondoc said.

The consultancy also exhorted offshore gaming companies, a growing source of tenants in Manila offices, to continue looking for space in Cebu, in addition to the provinces of Pampanga and Laguna.