At a glitzy show stall for a new residential development in Hong Kong, property agents with loudspeakers are promoting the latest trend in the overcrowded city - high-end ‘micro-flats’, which still come with an eye-watering price tag.

Hong Kong’s developers are reportedly trying to sell minuscule upmarket apartments to reel in young middle-class buyers. Although they are part of swish modern complexes, some of the newly-built studio flats measure as little as 16sqm and are on sale for HK$1.5m (£116,000).

Agents are selling these pint-sized flats on the basis that the market boom will only continue. Mont Vert is one development in the suburban neighbourhood of Tai Po. It boasts a clubhouse, sea views and surrounding greenery — but at 16sqm, its smallest units are only three times larger than the cells in Hong Kong’s most populous prison.

While some prospective buyers are desperate enough to snap up the tiny flats, there are those who are outraged by the conditions that some Hong Kong residents live in. “They are not only small, it is repressive. You are paying that much to be living there, it’s ridiculous,” Kenneth Tong, a spokesman for local NGO “No Flat Slaves” told AFP.

The organisation believes the government is to blame for a lack of affordable homes and being slow to build more public rental housing. Developers in London will no doubt be watching the sales rate of these flats with interest.