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PROPERTY developers continue to chalk up sales of private homes. Peak Development, part of Wee Cho Yaw’s privately held Kheng Leong group, did a preview at the weekend for a 24-storey freehold apartment project, The Chuan.

BT understands it has sold about 30 per cent of the 50 units released so far.

The project, in the established private-housing locale of Lorong Chuan, comprises 106 units in all.

The average price is $710 per square foot on normal progress payment terms.

For those who prefer a deferred payment scheme, the average price works out to a higher $722 psf.

Buyers pay 5 per cent on booking a unit, another 5 per cent eight weeks later, and the next payment of 10 per cent in January next year.

The rest is deferred until the project is completed in early 2008.

Kheng Leong is a boutique residential developer focusing mostly in the prime districts.

The Chuan, being marketed by CB Richard Ellis, boasts large master bedrooms with a walk-in wardrobe and big bathroom.

In the West Coast area, Frasers Centrepoint, which has been previewing its Infiniti condo on the former Faber Hills condo site, sold another 10 units last week, bringing total sales to almost 40 units since it began previews on April 8.

The buyers include Housing & Development Board flat upgraders living in areas like the West Coast, Clementi, Bukit Batok and Jurong. Colliers International is marketing the project, which comprises 315 units in total.

The 12-storey freehold project is priced on average at $550-560 psf.

Meanwhile, in the Katong area, a consortium led by United Industrial Corp sold about 30 units at One Amber condo during the weekend.

This brings total sales to 240 of the 300 units released so far at the freehold project, which was released at the start of this month.

The average price has edged up to $725 psf from the initial $720 psf.

One Amber comprises 562 units in total. UIC is jointly developing the project with Singapore Land and United Overseas Land on the former Maryland Park site.

Source : Business Times - 25 Apr 2006

WHEN it comes to property, what counts is location, location, location. And when it comes to stocks, what matters is timing, timing, timing.

For the hundreds of contra players who took the plunge last week, timing was a major consideration. If you were late in latching on to the momentum of China stocks like Celestial or Cosco, for example, you would have been badly burned when both came under heavy pressure on Friday.

If, however, you bought semiconductor stocks Utac, Chartered Semiconductor or Global Testing when they weakened earlier in the week, you would have enjoyed good contra profits had you sold on Friday.

Indeed, there were indications towards the end of the week that punters could be switching out of China stocks into tech counters, possibly thanks to brokers switching focus in terms of reports being issued.

Close watchers of the local market might have noticed a sharp drop in the number of ‘buy’ calls on China stocks and a concurrent increase in ‘buys’ on the tech sector. This is perhaps to be expected, since China stocks can no longer be considered cheap, having doubled and tripled in a few months while the tech sector has under-performed.

This could soon change. Memtech, for example, sprang to life on Friday after a JP Morgan report. Indeed, the entire semiconductor sector rose en masse on Friday, while several other tech counters such as Eucon have been quietly been rising to highs of their own.

Of course, trying to get the timing right through chance, luck or skill would be superfluous if one had advance knowledge of the release of an impending broking report, and it’s disconcerting to hear talk that retail punters are now trading based on rumours of upcoming research.

Possibly because of the confidence that such advance knowledge can bring, or because of the complacency that a bull market engenders, brokers last week reported normally conservative clients doubling and tripling their exposure to stocks in the hope they can get out with a suitable profit before their payment due date.

Shades of a speculative bubble? Yes, without a doubt. Then again, punters are merely playing into the hands of the syndicates, who at these levels and given this much liquidity, must surely be unloading as quickly as you can say ‘timing, timing, timing’.

Whatever your perspective on current developments, there’s no doubt the timing of the announcement of a general election was spot on insofar as the stock market was concerned, coming just after the release of the US Federal Reserve’s March minutes, which the market interpreted to mean that the interest rate hikes of the past two years may end soon.

Whether this pans out, or turns out to be another case of false optimism, remains to be seen. It’s worth remembering that the last time US investors ran away with the idea that the rate hikes were to end soon was back in December 2005, following the release of the Fed’s November minutes. They were wrong.

It makes more sense to assume that the Fed is not the omnipotent, all-knowing body that the market thinks it is, and is, in fact, as much in the dark as anyone else on the true state of inflation.

Given that Iran’s nuclear ambitions are now pushing oil prices up, and given the slide in the US dollar, it is by no means certain that the Fed will stop its tightening after one more 25-point hike. In fact, some US analysts warn that there could be as many as four more hikes of 25 basis points each which, if they do materialise, would take the short term rate to 5.75 per cent.

Source : Business Times - 24 Apr 2006

Q MY DAUGHTER is over 21, single, has a good job and some estate, including bank deposits, investment funds, insurance and CPF monies and property overseas.

In which scenario below do my husband and I have a definite chance of winning in a claim tussle?

Scenario A: My daughter does not include us in her will, so do we still stand a chance as legal parents to claim her estate under Intestacy rules compared with her boyfriend who is mentioned in her will?

Scenario B: If she includes her parents in her will, but at the same time signs a power of attorney for her boyfriend in the United States, which document will effectively be in force in a claim?

A I MAKE the following assumptions. Your daughter is not married in Singapore or overseas, and she has not made a will.

In such a situation, upon her dying, your husband and you will each be entitled to a half-share of her estate under the Intestate Succession Act in Singapore.

If your daughter has made a will in Singapore and has given all her assets to her boyfriend only, the boyfriend will inherit everything. You have the right to challenge the validity of the will in the Singapore courts.

If your daughter has made a will overseas, Singapore law would still apply to her will and the subsequent probate proceedings, if your daughter is Singaporean and she regarded Singapore as her permanent home.

Probate is the process of completing the legal formalities and distributing the assets according to the will. Under a power of attorney executed in Singapore, a person usually gives another person the power to deal with his assets or matters during his lifetime.

Usually, a power of attorney is not regarded as a will in Singapore as it does not comply with the stringent requirements set out under the Wills Act.

If your daughter executed her last will in Singapore, her will takes effect and her assets will be distributed according to it.

However, if the power of attorney is executed in the US, it would be governed by US law. You may need to obtain legal advice from an American lawyer on the nature and effect of the power of attorney.

Rajan ChettiarLawyerRajan Chettiar & Co

Source : Sunday Times - 23 Apr 2006

ANNOUNCING its second major residential site acquisition in a month, SC Global Developments yesterday said it is buying Hilltops Apartments at Cairnhill Circle for $294 million through a collective sale.

This works out to about $951 per square foot of potential gross floor area for the 67,308 sq ft freehold site. No development charge is payable.

SC Global, controlled by Simon Cheong, can redevelop the site - at the highest point of the Cairnhill area - into a 20-storey condo with about 150 units averaging 2,000 sq ft.

Analysts estimate the breakeven cost could be about $1,400 psf which should leave Mr Cheong with a nice profit margin given that the highest price fetched for a unit at the nearby Cairnhill Crest condo is $2,002 psf. SC Global has been successful in positioning itself as a luxury developer able to command premium prices.

The Hilltops Apartments deal is subject to approval by the Strata Titles Board as unanimous approval from owners has yet to be secured.

The owners of the 99 apartments will receive $2.8 million per unit while the owners of the three penthouses will pocket $5.6 million each. Recent transactions of apartments in the development have been at $1.5-1.6 million.

SC Global will use internal funds and bank borrowings to pay for the acquisition, which follows the group’s $266 million purchase of Paterson Tower last month.

DTZ Debenham Tie Leung handled the tender for Hilltops Apartments which closed on Wednesday and is said to have attracted one other bid that complied with tender conditions. Industry sources suggest the other bidder could have been Wing Tai, but its bid was short of owners’ expectations.

DTZ had also offered an adjacent parcel with Hilltops - 16 terrace houses surrounding part of the Hilltops site. The reserve price for the 49,856 sq ft plot is said to be about $100 million - which in terms of psf per plot ratio land cost, is about 15 per cent lower than the $948 psf ppr reserve price for Hilltops.

However, SC Global has decided against buying the 16 terrace houses. Market watchers say this may leave their owners in the lurch as it would be difficult to develop the 49,856 sq ft site on its own.

For the Hilltops site, written permission has been granted to redevelop it into a 20-storey residential project with a 4.59 plot ratio (ratio of potential GFA to land area).

The price is the highest fetched in the area during the current wave of collective sales. This week, BT reported that Hoi Hup is paying $795 psf ppr inclusive of development charge for the Cairnhill Gardens site. And last week, Chip Eng Seng paid $785 psf ppr for Venus Mansion in Peck Hay Road. Last month, Bukit Sembawang bought The Vermont for $750 psf ppr. In July last year, Wing Tai bagged Phoenix Mansion for $716 psf ppr.

The $951 psf ppr price that SC Global is paying for Hilltops is also within the range of other major sites in the Cairnhill area sold in the past and which have been redeveloped. These include the sites on which The Edge on Cairnhill, Light at Cairnhill and Cairnhill Crest now stand.

SC Global’s collective sale purchases of Hilltops Apartments and Paterson Tower bring its recent acquisitions to over $550 million and provide it with a landbank of over 550,000 sq ft gross floor area of prime residential space in the Orchard belt.

‘With these acquisitions, the group is well positioned to benefit from the strong sentiment in the high-end segment of the property market and continued interest in Singapore by international investors,’ the company said.

Source : Business Times - 21 Apr 2006

DESPITE the current collective sale craze, not all estates have been able to obtain the minimum requirement of 80 per cent consensus from their owners to go en bloc.

At Balmoral View, for instance, only 17 of the 22 owners, or about 77 per cent, have agreed to put their estate up for collective sale. That means the sale cannot go ahead under law.

But that has not stopped the prospective sellers - who stand to get 55 per cent more from a collective sale than from selling their units individually - from inviting expressions of interest for the Balmoral Road property.

They are apparently confident of winning over a crucial owner or two to pass the 80 per cent threshold.

The owners are asking $52 million for the estate, which works out to about $733 per sq ft (psf) per plot ratio (ppr), including an estimated development charge of $7.89 million.

In terms of unit land price, this price tag is slightly higher than nearby Casa Rosita at Bukit Timah Rd, which was sold earlier this month to GuocoLand for $280 million, or $707 psf ppr.

Casa Rosita is one of the latest of 14 collective sales worth some $1.8 billion to be concluded since the start of the year.

The 51,080 sq ft Balmoral View site has a plot ratio of 1.6 and can be redeveloped into a 12-storey condominium with 55 units of about 1,500 sq ft each, said CB Richard Ellis, which launched expressions of interest for it yesterday.

The estimated break-even cost is about $1,000 psf for the site, which currently hosts four townhouses, 10 lower maisonettes and eight upper maisonettes. Interested developers can offer expressions of interest until May 25.

Source : Straits Times - 20 Apr 2006