Singapore Property Weekly Issue 157

Issue 157
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CONTENTS
p2 5 Tips for Dealing with Repairs in
Rental Properties
p6 Singapore Property News This Week
p11 Resale Property Transactions
(May 7 – May 12 )
Welcome to the 157
th
edition of the
Singapore Property Weekly.
Hope you like it!
Mr. Propwise
FROM THE
EDITOR
SINGAPORE PROPERTY WEEKLY Issue 157
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By Property Soul (guest contributor)
I parked my car outside the house. A neighbor
accidentally kissed it and damaged the
license plate. It was replaced after a week so
I drove it to an 8 a.m. meeting on Monday.
Unfortunately, I was stuck on the highway for
an hour. When I reached the carpark, the
agitated vehicle was already complaining with
strange noises. It waited till I was on the way
back that it finally broke down on the left lane.
Three nice guys volunteered to push the
grumpy fellow to a side road. But somehow it
ended up outside a Singapore Pools outlet.
Patrons took the hint from the license number
to buy lottery. I was totally amused by the
embarrassment!
5 Tips for Dealing with Repairs in Rental Properties
SINGAPORE PROPERTY WEEKLY Issue 157
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Breakdowns are sometimes unavoidable in
the lifespan of cars. Similarly, breakdowns are
also commonplace in rental properties.
What do you expect to fix?
After a decade as a landlord, I have
experienced countless incidents of different
things not working in my tenanted units. From
the date of TOP to a few years down the
road, sooner or later things will start giving
you problems. It can be the air-conditioners,
water heaters, home appliances, fixtures and
fittings, or water leaks and seepage.
The developer may have installed something
substandard. Or a fixture is reaching almost
the end of its lifespan. Depending on your
luck, defects can range from wear and tear,
out of order, to damage beyond repair.
If you look around, you may notice that your
neighbor may be having the same fate. Talk
to the neighbors or the management office.
Most probably another unit has recently done
similar repair work. They can share the
contacts of any reliable contractor or
repairman with you.
Why don't things last?
When you visit sales galleries of property new
launches, the showflats usually showcase
top-of-the-line branded fixtures and
appliances. However, you will soon realize
that ‘looking good’ and ‘working fine’ are two
different things.
The air-conditioners, water heaters and built-
in home appliances may be from prestigious
European or Japanese brands. But the
developers are buying them in bulk from the
manufacturers. Developers are looking for
models that offer the biggest discount, not the
latest models selling at a premium.
SINGAPORE PROPERTY WEEKLY Issue 157
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Anyway, with concealed air-conditioning, no
one will check the model number of the air-
conditioners. And it is rare that anyone will
open the false ceiling of the bathrooms to
check the models of water heaters.
There is also considerable time lap between
orders placed by developers, to building
construction to project completion. By the
time your tenant moves in, chances are those
models installed at your unit have long been
discontinued.
How to make your life easier as a
landlord?
As a landlord, it is your responsibility to give
your tenant a one month’s warranty for
everything in your unit, except for damages
done by the tenant. You are also responsible
to keep all the home appliances you put in the
unit in good and working condition.
Nonetheless, there are a few tips that can
make your life as a landlord much easier:
1. File the operation manuals of all the
appliances and leave the file with your tenant
for easy reference. Ask your tenant to check
the operation manual for any machine
malfunction before contacting you or your
property agent.
2. Specify in the tenancy agreement that the
tenant is responsible for any repairs not
exceeding $100 or $150. This can save you
the hassles of going there to do all the minor
repairs, such as repairing a blown fuse or
changing a light bulb.
3. For the convenience of arranging repair
work, the tenancy agreement should state
that your tenant has to allow you or your
agents to enter the unit to inspect and do any
repair at a time agreeable by both parties.
SINGAPORE PROPERTY WEEKLY Issue 157
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4. Request your tenant to sign up for a
maintenance contract that services the air-
conditioners every quarter at the expense of
the tenant. Before the handover of the unit
back to you, your tenant has to service the
air-conditioners again and provide a copy of
the receipt that shows the last service date.
5. Avoid having any built-in home appliances
such as a fridge, oven, washing machine,
dryer, etc. at the unit. They only look neat and
nice at the showflat. Once anything breaks
down, it is difficult to repair. When it is beyond
repair, you can hardly find the same model or
model with exact measurements that can fit
perfectly. And even if space allows, having a
duplicate appliance next to the faulty one
looks odd.
By guest contributor Property Soul, a
successful property investor, blogger, and
author of the newly released No B.S. Guide to
Property Investment.
SINGAPORE PROPERTY WEEKLY Issue 157
Singapore Property This Week
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Residential
9,707 BTO flats to be released by HDB this
year
A total of 9,707 Build-To-Order (BTO) flats will
be released by the Housing Development
Board (HDB) this year. Out of the 6,454 flats
that are put on sale this month, 3,383 are
balance flats that are offered under the Sale
of Balance Flat exercise, while the remaining
flats are offered under the BTO scheme.
Subsequently, another 3,071 BTO flats will be
released in non-mature estates such as Bukit
Batok and Woodlands. According to Nicholas
Mak from SLP International, two-room flats
are most popular among singles at the last
BTO launch. Flats in Woodlands are expected
to a hot favourite among buyers as the
Woodlands Regional Centre is slated to be
constructed as part of the draft Master Plan
2013. Eugene Lim from ERA Realty predicts
that HDB prices will smoothen as demand for
resale flats stabilises.
(Source: Business Times)
Sale of Coco Palms driven by price cuts
Price cuts at the launch of Coco Palms
helped to drive sales. According to the
developer, 490 out of the 600 units available
at its weekend launch have been sold for an
average of $980 per square foot.
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This was marked down from its initial pricing
of $1,100 to $1,200 per square foot. Located
at Pasir Ris Grove neighbourhood, the joint
venture between City Development and Hong
Realty (Pte) Ltd consisted of a total of 944
units which are between 463 square feet for a
one-bedroom unit to 3,111 square feet for a
penthouse.
(Source: Business Times)
Hougang HUDC: 15
th
to be privatised
Joining 14 other Housing and Urban
Development Co (HUDC) estates, 336 flats at
Hougang Avenue 2 have been privatised after
obtaining support from at least 75 per cent of
the owners. The Aljunied- Hougang- Punggol
East Town Council will cease managing the
estate’s common properties as it will be
converted into a strata-titled property. While
the estate is the 15
th
estate to be privatised
out of the 18 HUDC estates, Ong Kah Seng,
R’ST Research Director, predicts that in the
short run, developers may not be willing to
offer a high price for the Hougang estate, due
to the tight property market.
(Source: Business Times)
Buyer and investor interests in dual-key
units remain undiluted
According to global consultancy Knight Frank,
demand in dual-key units will persist as buyer
and investor interests remain undiluted. Alice
Tan, director and head of consultancy and
research at Knight Frank claimed that dual-
key units are popular among developers as
they are easier to market as compared to
similar sized non-dual key units. Introduced in
1986 to promote multi-generational living, the
dual-key unit comprises of 2 sub units with
two separate keys and entrances.
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In January and February this year, four
projects were launched with dual-key units.
This reflected developers’ continued interest
in the dual-key model. Also, according to Ms
Tan, dual-key units are popular among young
families who want to stay near their parents.
Nonetheless according to Ms Tan, demand
for dual-key units has dipped from 100 per
cent in 2011, to 84 per cent in 2012, and
eventually to 58 per cent in 2013 following the
implementation of the total debt servicing
ratio framework.
(Source: Business Times)
Changes in ruling affected EC tender bids
New rules for executive condominium (EC)
buyers have affected bidding for EC land. A
pair of 99-year sites at Yishun Street 51 has
been tendered to different developers—a first
since the introduction of the system of
simultaneous tender closings for adjacent
residential sites in 2013. Parcel A at Yishun
Street 51 has been sold to a City
Developments Ltd-TID joint venture for
$330.13 per square foot per plot ratio, while
the neighbouring Parcel B is sold for $334.57
per square foot per plot ratio to JBE Holdings
which is run by Patrick Lam from Hong Kong.
Six bids were placed for Parcel A while Parcel
B had two more bidders. According to Eugene
Lim from ERA, Parcel B had more bidders as
it was located nearer to Lower Seletar
Reservoir.
(Source: Business Times)
Commercial
MTI: Rental hikes due to inflation
The Ministry of Trade and Industry (MTI)
revealed in the latest Economic Survey of
Singapore that the recent increase in rent
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prices observed is in line with inflation over
retailers’ lease period. Not only so, for 25 per
cent of retailers who renewed their leases last
year, there was no increase in rents; in fact,
some even renewed their leases at a lower
rent. MTI refuted speculations that retail rents
have been pushed up by real estate
investment trusts. However, property market
watchers and small and medium sized
enterprises that The Business Times spoke to
were unconvinced. The median cumulative
increase in rental in 2013 was 5.5 per cent
and 75 per cent of the leases were renewed
at rental increases of 14 per cent or less. On
average, rents doubled or more than doubled
in one per cent of the 2,100 leases renewed
each year, according to MTI.
(Source: Business Times)
Irving Industrial Building on sale for
$220m
Irving Industrial Building, a 30-years-old, six-
storey property near Tai Seng MRT is on sale
for $220 million. Tender for the collective sale
will close on July 15. The freehold building
which comprises of 65,309 square foot, is
selling for $1,164 per square foot of potential
gross floor area (GFA) including an estimated
$46 million development charge. It is
expected to be redeveloped into 228,581
square feet maximum GFA, with a 3.5
maximum gross plot ratio that is zoned for
Business 1- White use. Of this, 163,272
square feet GFA have been reserved for
Business 1 use while the remaining 65,309
square feet is zoned for white uses.
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Christina Sim from Cushman & Wakefield
claimed that the substantial white component
of the project justifies the steep asking price.
(Source: Business Times)
Two new hotels to be run by Accor
Two hotels located along Stevens Road,
which were developed by Oxley Holdings, will
be run by Accor, thus bringing the hotel
operator’s portfolio to nine hotels in
Singapore. The hotels which are under the
Novotel and Ibis brand names are expected
to open by the end of 2016. The land which
was acquired last March by Oxley is about
198,000 square feet and has a gross
permissible floor area of about 318,000
square feet and a 103-year leasehold tenure.
The new hotel, Novotel Singapore will have
254 rooms while the Ibis Singapore hotel will
have 528 rooms.
(Source: Business Times)
Next generation industrial facility will be
launched by J TC
JTC will be launching next generation
industrial buildings that are designed to
integrate land-based facilities with high-rise,
multi-user factories at Tampines North. Such
buildings, which are targeted to appeal to
small and medium sized enterprises that are
involved in heavier manufacturing, will feature
higher ceilings and wide corridors. The JTC
Space @ Tampines North will be a nine-
storey complex that comprises of five land-
based units between 1,200 and 1,900 square
meter; and 105 high rise units from 160 to
260 square meter. The industrial space is
expected to be completed by 2016 and will
begin construction by the end of this year.
(Source: Business Times)
SINGAPORE PROPERTY WEEKLY Issue 157
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Non-Landed Residential Resale Property Transactions for the Week of May 7 – May 12
Postal
District
Project Name
Area
(sqft)
Transacted
Price ($)
Price
($ psf)
Tenure
3 THE ANCHORAGE 1,163 1,630,000 1,402 FH
4 THE PEARL @ MOUNT FABER 1,604 1,850,000 1,153 99
4 THE PEARL @ MOUNT FABER 1,389 1,540,000 1,109 99
5 VARSITY PARK CONDOMINIUM 1,033 1,280,000 1,239 99
5 THE MAYLEA 1,249 1,500,000 1,201 FH
5 DOVER PARKVIEW 1,249 1,500,000 1,201 99
8 URBAN LOFTS 420 620,000 1,477 FH
8 KENTISH GREEN 1,324 1,309,770 989 99
9 THE PATERSON 1,313 2,650,000 2,018 FH
9 CAIRNHILL RESIDENCES 904 1,820,000 2,013 FH
9 2 RVG 893 1,638,000 1,833 FH
9 THE PIER AT ROBERTSON 743 1,320,000 1,777 FH
9 MIRAGE TOWER 1,227 2,000,000 1,630 FH
9 WILKIE 80 635 1,030,000 1,622 FH
9 HIGH POINT 2,928 4,350,000 1,486 FH
13 THE ACACIAS 1,378 1,430,000 1,038 FH
14 LA BRISA 431 628,000 1,459 FH
14 SIMSVILLE 980 928,000 947 99
14 THE ALCOVE 1,378 1,100,000 798 99
15 PEBBLE BAY 1,894 2,280,000 1,204 99
16 CASA MERAH 1,238 1,430,000 1,155 99
16 CHANGI GREEN 1,216 1,120,000 921 FH
18 NV RESIDENCES 797 913,000 1,146 99
18 CHANGI RISE CONDOMINIUM 1,281 1,200,000 937 99
Postal
District
Project Name
Area
(sqft)
Transacted
Price ($)
Price
($ psf)
Tenure
18 MELVILLE PARK 936 840,000 897 99
18 THE TROPICA 1,238 1,008,000 814 99
19 KOVAN MELODY 1,292 1,480,000 1,146 99
19 THE QUARTZ 1,130 1,180,000 1,044 99
19 RIO VISTA 1,249 1,020,000 817 99
21 SYMPHONY HEIGHTS 969 1,030,000 1,063 FH
21 PARC PALAIS 1,528 1,530,000 1,001 FH
21 SOUTHAVEN II 1,539 1,500,000 974 999
22 THE CENTRIS 1,313 1,400,000 1,066 99
22 THE LAKESHORE 1,109 1,175,888 1,061 99
22 PARC VISTA 1,076 1,008,888 937 99
22 LAKEPOINT CONDOMINIUM 1,033 870,000 842 99
23 HAZEL PARK CONDOMINIUM 1,550 1,538,000 992 999
23 HILLVIEW PARK 1,238 1,104,300 892 FH
26 SEASONS PARK 1,292 1,200,000 929 99
28 SERENITY PARK 1,324 1,348,000 1,018 FH
28 GRANDE VISTA 1,367 1,190,000 871 999
28 SELETAR SPRINGS CONDOMINIUM 1,636 1,020,000 623 99
NOTE: This data only covers non-landed residential resale property
transactions with caveats lodged with the Singapore Land Authority.
Typically, caveats are lodged at least 2-3 weeks after a purchaser
signs an OTP, hence the lagged nature of the data.