Tips for Checking Property Prices to Avoid Losing Hundreds of Millions: Beware the Overpay Risk!

The national property sector faces a heavy challenge at the start of 2026 as primary-market home sales slump. According to the Residential Property Price Survey (SHPR) published by Bank Indonesia, sales of new homes in the first quarter of 2026 contracted year-on-year and quarter-on-quarter. The year-on-year decline was mainly driven by a sharp drop in sales of smaller-type homes, while the quarterly drop was driven by soft market absorption for larger-type homes. This slowdown in the market directly affected the Residential Property Price Index (IHPR), which stood at 110.60 points, growing only 0.62% year-on-year, slower than the previous period’s 0.83%. This price stagnation has issued a stern warning to prospective buyers about the risk of paying more, or overpay, which could amount to hundreds of millions of rupiah. Property Valuer & Advisor Ni Luh Asti Widyahari said many consumers only realised these financial missteps after the transaction had occurred and the down payment had been paid. She argued that ignorance of the fair market price boundaries is the main reason for large losses for homebuyers. ‘Imagine someone buys a house for Rp4.2 billion. A few months later, a similar property in the same area is marketed at around Rp3.6 billion. That indicates an overpay of up to Rp600 million, making the home purchase a poor financial decision,’ she said on Tuesday, 21 May. Asti explained that for some time people have tended to buy property based on intuition, design, or facilities without support from accurate data analysis. In fact, property values in the same location can vary greatly, so a robust valuation method is needed to avoid losses. She emphasised that buying a home is one of the largest financial decisions in life and should not be taken on assumptions. ‘The decision to buy a home is the single largest financial decision in life and therefore requires considerable consideration to ensure the decision taken is correct. Of course we need tools in the form of data and information that are accurate so that our decision is correct,’ Asti, founder of Penilaian.id, concluded. In line with BI’s findings, Colliers Indonesia’s research shows price growth for small and medium-sized homes only in the range of 0.3 to 0.5 percent quarterly. Price increases are relatively stable only in strategic locations directly connected with access to new infrastructure projects, such as toll road and rail projects in West Java and Central Java. Data from Pinhome Indonesia Residential Market Report Semester 2 2025 & Outlook 2026 indicate the residential market faces a fairly significant inventory stagnation. Fiscal stimuli such as VAT on DTP and cuts to BPHTB have not yet been able to spur home sales, as mobility costs and transport access remain the main factors. Deflation is cited as a reason for the stagnation in sales. Our target as of August was to sell 57%; it turned out to be only 42%.