SGHOUSING.COM 新加坡房地产网

THE Hilltops Apartments at Cairnhill Circle are back on the collective sale market - two years after the owners backed away from selling en bloc because the price was not good enough.

The choice site is again being marketed with an adjacent row of 16 terrace houses.

And the two freehold plots, adding up to 117,164 square feet, are expected to fetch a total of about $414 million or $950 per square foot of potential gross floor area inclusive of any development charge (DC).

This is the same unit land price at which several major deals in the area were done during previous property booms.

These include the 1996 sale of the Cairnhill Hotel - now redeveloped into the Light at Cairnhill - across the road from Hilltops.

DTZ Debenham Tie Leung director Tang Wei Leng, whose firm brokered the Cairnhill Hotel deal and is marketing Hilltops and the 16 terrace houses, said yesterday: ‘We believe this combined site is poised to command similar prices and perhaps higher, given the positive outlook going forward.’

Expressions of interest were sought for Hilltops and the terrace houses in March 2004, Ms Tang said. Five submissions were received but they did not meet the owners’ expectations.

Hilltops comprises 99 apartments and three penthouses. The apartment owners hope to receive about $2.8 million per unit - more than double the price they would get if they sold individually without the collective sale factor.

The Hilltops site is 67,308 sq ft and written permission has been granted for a 20-storey residential project with a 4.59 plot ratio - the ratio of potential gross floor area to land area. Based on the $950 psf per plot ratio price expectation, Hilltops should fetch about $294 million.

No DC is payable for the Hilltops site. But an estimated $12.8 million DC is payable for developing the 49,856 sq ft site occupied by the 16 terrace houses.

This site is zoned for 20-storey residential use with a 2.8 plot ratio. Assuming the houses fetch a total of $120 million - based on the $950 psf per plot ratio inclusive of DC - their owners should walk away with $5 million to $11 million per house.

Again, this is more than double the price the homes would command if sold individually.

The combined site can be redeveloped into a new condo with over 200 units averaging 2,000 sq ft, analysts say.

DTZ’s Ms Tang says the attraction of combined sites is their vantage location at the high point of Cairnhill Circle, close to the Orchard Road area. The tender cloes on April 19.

Source : Business Times - 8 Mar 2006

SINGAPORE Land is tying up with Keppel Land by taking a 48 per cent stake in the latter’s freehold Avenue Park property at Sixth Avenue for $53.8 million or $463 per square foot per plot ratio (psf ppr)

The stake that SingLand is acquiring was formerly held by ComfortDelgro, which said yesterday that it had sold it to KepLand for $54.9 million. The SingLand-KepLand deal values the 172,820 sq ft site at $112 million or $463 psf ppr.

In November 2001, KepLand wrote down the site’s value to $366 psf ppr as part of a $455 million writedown of its landbank.

KepLand bought 47 of the 48 units at Avenue Park in April 1997 for $161.1 million.

The remaining unit was bought later after some legal technicalities were completed, according to an earlier media report.

The site is slated for redevelopment into a new condo with over 190 units and the project is on track for launch in the second half of this year - despite yesterday’s announcement of shareholding change.

SingLand’s director, president and chief executive Lim Hock San is also a director of KepLand’s parent Keppel Corporation.

SingLand said the joint venture will enable it and KepLand to use their ‘respective strengths for the development of high-end, upmarket residential units in Singapore for both the local and foreign markets’.

ComfortDelgro said the disposal of its stake in the project was in line with its overall strategy to divest all non-core assets.

Source : Business Times - 4 Mar 2006

$289m properties will be injectedinto its Asian Retail Mall Fund II

PRAMERICA Asia - formerly known as GRA Singapore - has bagged DBS Tampines Centre and the adjacent Pavilion complex near Tampines MRT Station for $288.9 million.

It has bought the property for its Asian Retail Mall Fund (ARMF) II fund, which closed last month with US$400 million of equity raised. The plan is to redevelop the combined site of 90,689 sq ft into a mall with a total gross floor area of about 380,894 sq ft.

Knight Frank, which handled the tender for the two properties, said yesterday the deal sets two records. ‘First, $288.9 million is the highest sale quantum achieved in a collective sale since the $370 million sale of Cairnhill Court in 2000. Second, together with an estimated development charge of $9.97 million, the price works out to be $785 per square foot per plot ratio - the highest unit land price for a suburban site.’

Based on the acquisition price for the Tampines properties, the breakeven cost for a new mall will be about $1,700 to $1,800 psf. The target net property yield is reportedly at least 6 per cent.

This will be the second property for the fund after Liang Court Mall, which it is buying for about $175 million.

Pramerica Asia - which does the asset and fund management for ARMF I and II - is part of US-based Prudential Real Estate Investors. Headed by Josephine Au-Yeong, Pramerica Asia manages six funds that hold a total of almost US$3 billion of assets. These include residential developments in China, luxury homes in Hong Kong, offices in Tokyo, Korea (including Hansol Building in Seoul) and Hong Kong (like PCCW Tower) and malls.

ARMF I, whose S$320 million equity was fully invested in 2004, owns four malls in Singapore - Tiong Bahru Plaza, Century Square at Tampines, White Sands at Pasir Ris and Hougang Mall.

The two funds have some common investors, including Pramerica-linked entities, Guthrie and three big Dutch pension funds. NTUC FairPrice invested in the first fund but not the second. The second fund also has some new investors.

Market watchers expect that when the first fund’s seven-year life runs out in two years, a natural exit strategy for its investors will be to spin off a real estate investment trust (Reit).

And when the second fund’s term expires, the properties in this fund could then be offered to the Reit, analysts suggest.

Asia Malls Management, a joint venture between the funds and Guthrie, handles the retail management for both funds. The new mall planned for the DBS Tampines Centre and Pavilion site will be the second owned by these funds near Tampines MRT Station, after Century Square.

Industry observers expect the new mall to feature mostly speciality outlets, rather than anchor tenants like hypermarkets or furniture retailers, to avoid a head-on clash with the big-box formats of Dairy Farm, Ikea and Courts that will open nearby in the Tampines/Pasir Ris area near the wafer fab plants.

Redevelopment of the two Tampines buildings is not expected to start until next year, as the properties will only be handed over and the purchase completed in December.

DBS Tampines Centre was securitised by DBS Bank in 1999, and Pavilion is owned by Cathay Organisation. The tender attracted four other bids - from CapitaLand (whose CapitaMall Trust owns the nearby Tampines Mall), Lippo group, Lend Lease and Centrepoint.

Source : Business Times - 3 Mar 2006

Highest offer of $128m works out to new record of $1,130 psf ppr

THE tender for the freehold Eng Lok Mansion, near the Botanic Gardens, has attracted eight bids. And the highest offer - said to be about $128 million - works out to a record $1,130 per square foot per plot ratio.

The top bid for the Napier Road property is believed to have been placed by parties linked to former Parkway Holdings boss Tony Tan, working with Penang’s Island Hospital group in which Mr Tan’s family has a stake. Parkway Group is also understood to have placed a bid, of about $120 million.

Based on the $1,130 psf ppr top bid, the breakeven cost for a new condo would be about $1,500 to $1,600 psf.

If $1,130 psf ppr is indeed the highest bid and the property is awarded to the top bidder, it will pip the highest-ever unit land price for a freehold residential site in Singapore - $1,122 psf ppr that Hong Leong Group paid in April 1997 for Boulevard Hotel, which has been approved for redevelopment into a condo.

The highest-ever unit land cost for a collective sale so far is $1,093 psf ppr paid by Far East Organization in January 1997 for Scotts Tower.

Incidentally, Eng Lok’s top bid also busts the recent high of $1,058 psf ppr set last month when Far East bought Angullia Mansion.

‘But the difference is that the Angullia Mansion site can be redeveloped up to 36 storeys high, whereas the Eng Lok site has a 10-storey height limit. So the price for Eng Lok does seem high,’ says a market watcher.

But others beg to differ. Wheelock Properties (Singapore) CEO David Lawrence, whose company was not among the bidders for Eng Lok, said: ‘Our Grange Residences project has proved that the location is extremely popular.’

Mr Lawrence, who is also chairman of UK-based property consultancy Hamptons Group, said: ‘Singapore is becoming increasingly attractive to invest in. I am surprised by the level of interest from UK, Irish and German investors asking me about investing in Asia, particularly Singapore. Already, I have an Irish group asking me if they can buy a lot of units in Scotts Square. Singapore is looking very attractive as an investment location for international investors.’

Besides often-cited factors like good government, ‘Singapore is seen as a place where a lot of the emerging middle class money from China and India will go to. They see Singapore as a place that will do very well for the next 10 years’, Mr Lawrence added.

Scotts Square is the new project that Wheelock will develop on the Scotts Shopping Centre and The Ascott serviced residences site.

The tender for Eng Lok Mansion closed on Tuesday. The other bidders are said to include CapitaLand, Lippo Group and Simon Cheong’s SC Global.

Market watchers say Parkway Group’s bid of $120 million is probably conditional on the site being re-zoned from residential to healthcare use, since it could then build an extension to its Gleneagles Hospital next door to Eng Lok Mansion.

The 70,810 sq ft Eng Lok Mansion site is zoned for 10-storey residential use with a 1.6 plot ratio (ratio of potential maximum gross floor area to land area) under Master Plan 2003. But marketing agent CB Richard Ellis (CBRE) was reported as saying in December last year that ‘alternative development options could possibly be explored with the relevant authorities due to its strategic location’. At the time, it was suggested that alternative uses could include hospitals, medical suites or a hotel. BT understands that Eng Lok Mansion’s owners submitted an application to the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) to explore some of these alternative uses, most likely hospital, but that URA recently rejected the application.

Source : Business Times - 2 Mar 2006

Freehold properties Hilton Towers, Katong Shopping Arcade go en bloc

THE en bloc sale bandwagon continues to gain momentum. Two more collective sale sites were launched yesterday - Hilton Towers at Leonie Hill with a $77 million price tag, and Katong Shopping Arcade with a $22 million indicative price. Both are freehold properties.

And over in the Dunearn Road area, SingTel has launched its residential development site at 1 Hillcrest Road. BT reported last week that the asking price is about $95 million. The 256,486 sq ft site comprises two land parcels - one with a remaining lease of about 85 years and the other with 75 years. The successful bidder will have to pay the state almost $40 million - comprising a premium to top up the lease to 99 years, and another to change the site’s use from utility to residential. The expected $95 million land price plus the near-$40 million payment to the state works out to a unit land price of about $375 psf of potential gross floor area. Provisional approval has been granted for two-storey, strata landed terrace houses with a 1.4 plot ratio - the ratio of potential gross floor area to land area.

Market watchers say the successful bidder could instead apply to the authorities to develop a five-storey condo with a 1.4 plot ratio. Based on the $375 psf land cost, the breakeven cost works out to about $650 psf for a condo and $1.45 million per strata terrace house.

Jones Lang LaSalle is handling the tender for the property, which closes on March 29. A SingTel spokesman said the sale is in line with its strategy to better utilise capital and free up cash that can be redeployed in its telecommunications business or new investments. Hilton Towers’ $77 million price tag works out to be $843 psf of potential gross floor area inclusive of a $3.9 million development charge (DC) and about $600,000 payable for a neighbouring 816 sq ft plot that now houses an electrical substation. Hilton Towers has a 33,700 sq ft site area.

The subject is zoned residential with a 2.8 plot ratio. Colliers International, which is marketing the site, says expressions of interest close on March 30.

Boutique developers more keen on the Guillemard and Tanjong Katong area may be interested in Katong Shopping Arcade. The $22 million indicative price works out to about $300 psf per plot ratio including a $1.5 million DC. Under Master Plan 2003, the property can be redeveloped into a residential project with commercial use on the first storey at a 2.8 plot ratio. DTZ Debenham Tie Leung is handling the tender for the property, which closes on March 30.

Source : Business Times - 2 Mar 2006