Map of Cebu. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO
CEBU CITY — Experts predicted that the biggest boom in the real estate industry in the country will take place in 2024.
However, Anthony Leuterio, president of A Better Real Estate Philippines (ABREP), warned that the development may also attract more “colorum” salespersons with a tendency to scam property buyers.
The number one target of scammers are overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) where a huge chunk of remittances are invested in real estate.
“If there is a demand, there might be people who will take advantage,” said Leuterio, who believed that professionalizing real estate salespersons should be done now and ahead of the 2024 boom.
Leuterio explained the real property projects were put on hold for the past two years because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Now that the economy is opening up, more projects are in the pipeline to answer the demand and are expected to be up in the market by 2024.
Some 500 accredited real estate salespersons from all over Visayas gathered in Cebu City for the first Real Estate Service Leadership Summit on Thursday.
Dr. Eduardo Ong, chairman of the Philippine Federation of Real Estate Service Professionals, estimated over 120,000 unlicensed real estate salespersons or otherwise known as colorum.
Ong, who is also the dean and professor at the BS Real Estate at the Lyceum of Alabang, believed that these unlicensed salespersons should instead be encouraged to be professionalized and allowed to undergo the accreditation process.
Data from the Accredited Real Estate Salespersons of the Philippines (ACRES) showed that the biggest buyer of real property in the Philippines are OFWs where sales are estimated to value at P1 trillion.
Both Leuterio and Ong believed that if unlicensed salespersons are professionalized, these would hinder scams because they will now be organized and covered with rules and ethical standards.
The stakeholders in the summit are calling on the government to address the issues that would aid in expediting the professionalization of real estate salespersons.
They said that the real estate industry is being regulated by two government agencies with two different sets of rules. These are the Department of Human Settlement and Urban Development; and the Professional Regulations Commission.
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