Category Archives: Luxury Property

Upbeat outlook on luxury market

WHEELOCK Properties (Singapore) CEO David Lawrence remains upbeat about prospects for Singapore’s luxury residential property market, as the island is increasingly attracting rich people and businesses.

‘The interesting thing is that more and more people are becoming PRs and citizens,’ he says. ‘A lot of them are very rich and want the best product. So you’ve got to be a good developer producing good products like Wheelock or SC Global or Hotel Properties Ltd (HPL).’

Wheelock owns about 16 per cent of SC Global and almost 21 per cent of HPL. ‘We’re happy with our stakes in these companies,’ Mr Lawrence said in a recent interview with BT.

In April last year, he apologised to shareholders at an annual general meeting for having bought a stake in SC Global at the top of the market in 2007. But now he lets on: ‘I should tell you that I have had approaches from Middle Eastern investors recently to buy our stake in SC Global and I said: ‘Not interested. Thank you very much’.’

Wheelock acquired its SC Global stake at an average price of $2.35 a share. SC Global’s stock price fell from a high of $3.40 in June 2007 to a low of 29.5 cents in March this year. It has since been recovering, ending at $1.41 yesterday, down one cent from Thursday’s closing price. Continue reading

In dollar terms, ‘09 home sales pale before record of ‘07

Volumes may be as high, but units sold this year are smaller and less expensive

Numbers tell only half the story. While developers are heading towards the record number of private homes sold in 2007, CB Richard Ellis says that the total transaction value of primary market sales in 2009 so far – at about $11.2 billion – is only about half the $23 billion worth of new homes sold in the peak year of 2007.

The smaller value of total private homes sold by developers this year reflects the fact that mass-market homes have hogged the limelight this year, unlike 2007, when the spotlight was on the luxury market.

Median prices per unit transacted, both in absolute dollar as well as per square foot terms, have also been lower this year compared with 2007. With the focus on small-format units to move sales, the median size of units sold so far this year is also smaller than in 2007.

CBRE based its analysis on caveats data captured up to Oct 27 in Urban Redevelopment Authority’s Realis system.

This year, the strongest quarterly showing was in Q3, when developers sold about $5.8 billion worth of private homes, up from $1.36 billion in Q1 and $4.05 billion in Q2.

This pick-up has much to do with the stages of recovery in home buying. Continue reading