Collective sale via the ‘expression-of-interest’

Collective sale via the ‘expression-of-interest’ route can help owners seek better prices for their homes as evidenced by an almost 40 per cent increase in the asking price for Tulip Garden.

The condominium, which is at the junction of Holland Road and Farrer Road, was put on the market through an expression-of-interest exercise in January with an indicative price of $900 per square foot per plot ratio (psf ppr), including development charge.

The 316,709 sq ft site was, however, relaunched yesterday with the new indicative price of $1,250 psf ppr, including development charge.

Based on a plot ratio of 1.6 and a maximum gross floor area of 506,734.4 sq ft, the site could fetch over $633 million.

Steven Ming, director of investment sales at Savills Singapore, which is marketing the site, said: ‘We received pretty attractive offers - what would had been benchmark prices for the location. Unfortunately, we were not able to consider them further as we did not have the requisite 80 per cent mandate to do so.’

Heartened by earlier expressions of interest though, 80 per cent of owners at Tulip Garden have now agreed to proceed with a collective sale if its target price is met.

Savills also remains confident that the new, higher, indicative prices could be met. This, despite some developers becoming increasingly wary of owners’ price expectations.

‘It’s a different Singapore today and developers still remain bullish about prospects for the upper end residential sector. For as long as they continue to sell and get good prices for their products, it is unlikely that they will find prices getting too high,’ said Mr Ming.

Last month, Guocoland bought neighbouring Leedon Heights for $835 million or about $1,062 psf ppr, including a development charge.

Next door, Farrer Court was put on the market this month for about $1.5 billion. Including development charge and topping up the 99-year lease, the price works out to be around $850 psf ppr.

It was also reported this month that the asking price for Farrer Court was $900 million three months earlier.

There appears to be sufficient demand for prime sites. BT understands that as many as five developers had earlier expressed interest in Tulip Garden.

Source: The Business Times, 29 May 2007