SINGAPORE, March 5 — Make room Eduardo Saverin, Nathan Tinkler and Jim Rogers, Singapore’s super-rich club is about to get a little crowded.

The Republic is expected to see the world’s largest influx of super-rich individuals over the next 10 years, with 1,752 people joining the ranks of the so-called ultra-high-net-worth individuals (UHNWIs) by 2024, a report by property consultancy Knight Frank showed today.

The projected addition to Singapore’s wealth brigade is higher than that of cities such as Hong Kong, New York and London, and will see the number of people with net assets of US$30 million (109.5 million) or more here soar by 54.3 per cent to 4,979 in 2024, said the Wealth Report.

Knight Frank Singapore’s head of consultancy and research Alice Tan said the nation’s attractiveness lies in its standing as a regional hub and pro-business environment.

“Singapore’s strengthening position as a regional financial and transport hub, coupled with a stable and pro-business government, has attracted MNCs to relocate their regional operations here,” Ms Tan said. “These strong attributes have also attracted many ultra-high-net-worth individuals to relocate to and invest in Singapore, especially in real estate.”

However, while the wealthy continue to flock here, the value of luxury residential properties has tumbled significantly, with Singapore slipping almost to the bottom of Knight Frank’s Prime International Residential Index (PIRI) rankings last year.

In fact, the Republic was the only Asian country among the bottom 40 in the PIRI table, ranking 98th out of 100 markets.

Analysts said this is largely due to the Government’s property curbs, with the luxury market being the worst hit because of the additional buyer’s stamp duty (ABSD).

“The ABSD has put off a lot of luxury buying by foreigners. When we talk about properties worth S$5 million or more, 15 per cent stamp duty is a lot of money. It’s not that this group can’t afford it, but there’s that psychological barrier that holds them back and that’s why we’ve seen luxury-home prices drop,” said property firm Chris International’s director Chris Koh.

Prices of homes in the Core Central Region, or city centre, have been on a downtrend since the second quarter of 2013. By the end of last year, prices had fallen 6.6 per cent, statistics by the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) showed.

Mr Koh expects the drop in prices to reach 10 per cent or more by the middle of the year. That would lure potential buyers waiting on the sidelines to return, he said. — Today