Foreign, mainland students flock to Hong Kong, sparking property demand in education sector
The projected enrolment growth signals sustained education-property demand that could support campus conversions, student accommodation investment and transactions involving suitable retail podiums.
Hong Kong could have around 200,000 non-local students by 2035, requiring 40 to 50 new campuses and more than 70,000 additional student beds.
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Hong Kong’s bid to become a global education hub is likely to transform the sector as a sustainable source of property demand, with the city tipped to see around 200,000 non-local students by 2035, according to CBRE.
The city’s international schools are estimated to require enormous additional real estate to accommodate around 30,000 to 40,000 non-local students, as the institutions would need to set up 40 to 50 new school campuses.
This could mean up to an extra 1.11 million sq m (12 million sq ft) of gross floor area, a study released by the consultancy on Monday showed.
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At the tertiary level, with a projected inflow of 150,000 students, universities were likely to expand their academic space by 1.39 million to 2.14 million sq m.
Currently, Hong Kong’s 12 institutions that award degrees occupy around 4 million sq m of gross floor area.
Moreover, the student accommodation segment would need more than 70,000 additional beds to provide living space for these students in about a decade.
“Hong Kong’s education sector is undergoing a structural transformation,” said Marcos Chan, executive director and head of research at CBRE Hong Kong.
“Historically, education demand was closely linked to local demographics, but future growth will increasingly be driven by non-local students, talent migration and the city’s position as an international education hub.”
The trend “will establish education as one of the most important long-term demand drivers for Hong Kong real estate, creating sustained requirements for campuses, academic facilities and student accommodation”.
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The sector’s expansion is underpinned by support from the government, which launched the initiative to attract more international students in 2024, as well as programmes to lure wealthy immigrants and professional talent to Hong Kong, with many bringing dependents including school-aged children.
Mainland Chinese students were expected to be the main source of inflow of new students into Hong Kong, given the current geopolitical concerns over studying in the West, while the city’s universities have also placed prominently in various rankings.
CBRE noted that Hong Kong was home to five universities featured in the QS World University Rankings for 2027, with the University of Hong Kong and the Chinese University of Hong Kong both ranked among the Global Top 20.
In Asia, Hong Kong boasts five universities within the Top 10 of the same rankings.
Additionally, eight universities from Hong Kong were included in the Times Higher Education Asia University Rankings for 2026, with five making it into the Top 20 list.
Between January 2025 and August this year, CBRE tracked about 49,000 sq m of new spaces leased by education groups and property acquisitions worth HK$845 million ($136.3 million).
Meanwhile, during the same period, the agency said there were 4,500 student bedrooms expected to become available, in addition to the 9,500 already in place.
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For investors, the future requirements of the education sector could be a huge opportunity given that many of the city’s neighbourhood malls struggle amid a narrow-based recovery of the retail sector.
Retail podiums, typically the lower floors of a residential estate, were particularly favoured as current regulations bar high-rise buildings as venues for academic facilities for schoolchildren.
“We are seeing a lot of transactions where international schools are buying or leasing retail podiums and we believe this trend will continue because of the rising demand,” Chan said.
The record real estate demand of the education segment has been driving investor appetite for Hong Kong’s property assets, including those coming from overseas, said Frederick Lai, senior director for capital markets at CBRE.
“We know of at least 500,000 sq ft of demand for space, whether it’s from existing schools in Hong Kong or new groups trying to set up a campus here,” he said.