Sandy white beach, clear blue skies, exotic architecture, colourful language and culture, warm and hospitable people, as well as spices that would introduce you to a wide range of flavours you never would have experienced anywhere else on this planet – what is not to love about Southeast Asia?

Giant companies such as Apple, Amazon, Disney, Google, Harley Davidson and Hewlett-Packard started out in their garages. Hey, you got to start somewhere. However, the entrepreneurial landscape has changed tremendously in the age of information.

After years of declining home prices in Singapore, analysts are expecting a turnaround as early as this year even as most of the government’s property cooling measures remain in place.Singapore property prices will rise between 5 percent and 10 percent next year after bottoming out in 2017, analyst Vikrant Pandey at UOB Kay Hian said.

The threat of government curbs to tame prices makes Singapore and Hong Kong residential property unattractive, the regional head of UBS Group AG’s real-estate investment arm said.“We have no exposure in the Singapore residential market and we are very comfortable not having any exposure,” Graham Mackie, head of real estate for Asia Pacific at UBS Asset Management, said in an interview.

In 2017, the Southeast Asian region has recorded a combined population of over 640 million people - approximately 8.5 percent of the world’s population - as ASEAN (the Association of Southeast Asian Nations) turns 50 years old. According to a World Bank report, ASEAN is currently the world’s third largest market ahead of Japan, USA and the EU (European Union).

After years of declines, Singapore’s home sales are on a roll, even as purchases by foreign buyers have remained muted.Stringent stamp duties levied by the government have had the intended effect of damping speculative foreign demand, with foreign buyers accounting for just 6 percent of purchases in the first half, data from Cushman & Wakefield show.