Mine is an old building, 3 floors walk up, 500sqf and was newly renovated when i moved in. She's been nice to me and in the middle of 1+1 she didn't increase the rent. 2 yrs ago rents were low but last year prices went up. Her angle was that she's been nice to me and didn't increase the rent last year so asked me not to push about lowering the rent which i found reasonable. My problem is i hate moving. Nevertheless I told her that I'll be looking around and if I find a sweeter place I'll probably move. She told that it's fine as long as I give her enough time to find a new tenant or I find someone to replace me and then move out. So it was a nice chat which lasted for an hour. Besides 6,700 is reasonable rent for the place I'm staying. I checked with the agents rents are still around 8k. So I can't just bluff that I found a cheaper place.I hope to find a better place around north point or chai wan though.
Let's see how it goes.

[priyapravin]

Hi ,

There is no harm in asking the landlord to lower the rent.In fact I feel he will readily agree.Because if he doesn't ,he knows you will be moving out since the initial 12 months are over and then he has to search for another tenant and also pay the property agent a fee.
So to save all that I am sure he will agree..

cheers!

[Alphacat]

I think a 10% decrease would not be hard to get at all. This is assuming your contract is almost up or that you are on monthly basis.

The thing is, the entire HK real estate market is taking a slump, that includes both buying and rental. Thus, there is no reason for a serviced apartment, or any apartment, to have its rent stay stagnant. Considering how many expats and people in all industries lost their jobs, your landlord should be happy that you're still keeping the apartment, and should do anything to appease you.