Singapore private home prices increased by 1.7% in 2009

The overall prices of private properties have increased by 1.7% in 2009. Most of the increases were seen in the second half of the year after a horror start to 2009.

The first quarter saw a 14.1% decrease in prices, with only 2596 new units transacted and January being the worst month that saw a mere 100 transactions. The prices decrease at a lower 4.7% in the second quarter, but rebounded spectacularly by 15.8% in the third quarter with over 5570 new units sold - the biggest quarterly rise in 28 years and one that ended 12 dismal months of price decline. Given the rapid pace of price growth and fearing the prospects of a property bubble forming, the Government decided to intervene in September. The interest absorption scheme was removed, which took many property speculators out of the market. The measures dampened market sentiments but could not prevent prices jumping 7.3% in the fourth quarter.

Mass market housing was the star segment with record levels reached. URA data showed that non-landed home prices in the suburbs edged up 5.8% in the fourth quarter. This is far lower than the 16.1% climb in the third quarter but it brought the full-year increase to 11.2%. Deep discounts are said to be no longer available in this segment of the market.

Prices of non-landed homes on the city fringes rose 9.5% in the fourth quarter and were up 3.1% overall for the year. But prices for non-landed city centre homes were down 2% for 2009 although the 7.1% increase for the fourth quarter points to a recovery. The good response to selective high-end projects launched in the fourth quarter, such as Marina Bay Suites, Cyan and Parvis, had fuelled the price rise.

The robust showing since the second half of 2009 seems to have boosted confidence that has carried over to the new year. The Shore Residences in Katong, which was launched on January 1st after a late December preview, has sold 183 out of the 338 units that were released.

Property experts believe that prices may surpass the previous peak by the end of the year. Private home prices may rise by about 10% this year, but the mass market segment may see a slightly lower increase. This is because much of the pent-up demand has been satisfied, so there will be less panic or euphoric buying especially in view of the price increases. On the other hand, the high ($1600psf or more) and luxury-end ($2000psf or more) segments should see better upside, as these still trail peak prices by more than 15%.

With the scheduled opening of the two IRs this year, and the return of international property buyers into the market, continual improvement in the property sector is expected in 2010, particularly with investment/higher grade properties. This is with the assumption that the Singapore economy continues to improve, and nothing overly bad happening that will  cause the world economies to spiral downward again this year.



(* Note: some of the information above was extracted from a report in The Straits Time today)

FLORIDIAN (Review)

District: 21
Location: Bukit Timah
Address: 956 Bukit Timah Road
Developer: Far East Organization
Tenure: Freehold

The wife and I decided to revisit FLORIDIAN this morning. This is another one of those that we classify under “older” new development, as it was first launched in mid-2007. FLORIDIAN is located off Bukit Timah Road – if you are driving up from town, you will have to turn left into the side road immediately after “The Nexus” (another condo). The sales gallery/showflat is at the actual site itself.

The land that FLORIDIAN sits on is about 230,000sqft. There are a total of 336 apartment units spread over 11 towers of 10-storey each. The TOP was originally expected in 2013, but construction works have been way ahead of schedule thus far, so the TOP is now moved foreward to end-2011 or early-2012.

The name FLORIDIAN was derived from the Miami-inspired resort lifestyle that the development will provide for its residents – “Where lavish landscapes and enclaves of themed indulgences are set around gorgeous cascading pools. Where the days are pampering and the nights are fascinating. Where beautiful people sizzle, and the trendy mingle”. So goes the marketing literature…

The facilities within FLORIDIAN revolve around the three cascading pools that run the length of Floridian’s landscape, providing a sense of Miami styled waterfront living. Built along these waters are five differently themed enclaves, each eliciting a unique ambience of indulgence:
• Downtown – Head to the rooftop for a game of tennis (2 courts) or take a dip in the lap pool with hydrotherapy facilities.

• The Keys – The Keys is perfect for poolside dinner parties, and chilling out under the stars thereafter.

• The Verandah – Occupying the highest point on the Floridian terrain, The Verandah offers spectacular views of the central waterscape, either from the tropical garden on the rooftop, or under the canopy of swaying palms on the ground level.

• Hideaway – Where you will find beautiful cascading pools, alongside spa seats under the shade of swaying palms.

• South beach – Themed-park inspired entertainment for children, while parents can indulge at the pool alcoves with jet massages, outdoor hot tubs and alfresco dining facilities.

For parking, there will be a total of 360 underground carpark lots available in the development.

There are several unit types that are available at FLORIDIAN

• 2-Bedrooms: 840 – 947sqft
• 3-Bedrooms: 1281 – 1432sqft
• 4-Bedrooms: 1830 – 2347sqft

This is where things get a bit murky – there are also “2+Study (2S)” and “3+Study (3S)” units within the development. The floor area info for these are not stated anywhere in the marketing literature or public domain, but we understand from the marketing agent that the size of a 3S unit is around 1658sqft. However, we have forgotten to ask about the size of the 2S units (paisei!).

We understand that all units in Towers 1 & 2 were sold out during the first phase. Units for sales in the current phase are apartments in Towers 4, 6, 7, 9 & 10. Most towers have only 2 apartments per floor, which allows for added privacy. As of today, the number of units sold at each tower is

• Tower 4 (3S): 16 out of 18 units
• Tower 6 (3S): 10 out of 20 units
• Tower 9 (4-Bedrooms): 1 out of 20 units
• Tower 7 (3S): Just released, so sales numbers not disclosed yet.
• Tower 10 (2 & 4-Bedrooms): Just released all 2-Bedrooms, so sales numbers not disclosed yet as well.

Towers 5 & 8 have also just been released, and these are supposedly the best facing – the front of each unit has full pool view, while the back has unblocked view of the good-class bungalow precinct along Old Holland Road. However, there is currently a pricing issue with these two towers. Apparently, Far East sold two 3S units in these towers during the first launch, reportedly at $1712 & $1750psf respectively. Now that similar units at the other towers are asking for much lower psf prices, there is some dilemma about what price to launch these towers at, given the need to protect the original buyers’ interests.

Towers 3 and 11, which are considered by the developer as the “premium blocks”, are unreleased yet.

The only showflat available is a 1658sqft, 3S unit. You get a private lift that opens to your private foyer, and a common lift that is accessible from the main door. The living/dinning room is a 6m X 6m square, with 60cm X 60cm marble-slab flooring and ducted air-con. The trapezoid-sized balcony is almost 100sqft, but the odd shaped design greatly reduced its functionality. You also get both wet and dry kitchens that come with “Teka” brand oven, hood & Hob. The wet kitchen is located in the yard area, together with the home shelter/maid’s room and toilet.

The common bathroom comes with ceramic tiles flooring, “Newform” bathroom fittings and top-hung cabinet. Quality of the fittings especially the cabinet is average. The master bedroom is of decent size, while there is an option to convert the study next door to a walk-in wardrobe. The master bath has marble flooring/walls, separate shower stall & bath tub, and top-hung cabinet. Quality of the fittings is again average. The two common bedrooms are tucked inwards next to the study.

Although there is no showflat for the 4-bedroom unit, we actually prefer the layout we saw of the scale model. The 4-bedder has a square balcony (more functional), and proper wet & dry kitchens that do not intrude into the yard space. The 4-bedroom units also supposedly come with better quality furnishings, and larger marble-slabs (90cm X 90cm) for the living/dining room floors. But we can only take the marketing agent’s words on these.

What we like:

• The living spaces are very functional – all rooms (except for some of the balconies) are regular with no odd shaped corners.

• The access road that leads to FLORIDIAN runs about 100m from the main Bukit Timah Road. Thus the development will not bear the full brunt of traffic noise coming from the constantly heavy traffic flow along Bukit Timah Road, unlike some of the other condominium projects located along the main road.

• FLORIDIAN is located very near to amenities at Bukit Timah Plaza and King Albert Park. It is also about a 15- 20 minutes drive to the City Centre/CBD. The future King Albert Park MRT station is supposedly 0.8km, or a 5 – minutes walk, away.

What we dislike:

• FLORIDIAN is surrounded by “Nexus” and “Maplewood” in front, and “Cascadale” on its right. Given that all these condominium projects are built to the maximum height allowance of 10-Storey (due to height restrictions imposed on apartments along Bukit Timah Road), some of the lower-floor apartment owners may feel a tad claustrophobic.

• There is a small “design flaw” with the 3S showflat we saw today – the common bathroom is located in the living/dining room itself, while the 2 common bedrooms are tucked inwards next to the master bedroom & study. So occupants of the common bedrooms have to run out to the living room to use the bath/toilet, which is quite a distance especially when you have a bursting bladder.

• The only primary school that is within 1-km of FLORIDIAN is Methodist Girls’ School – not good news for those parents with boys.

• And most importantly - the price. The average cost of the 3S unit is around $1450psf, while the price of the 4-bedders averages around $1630psf. We felt this is rather high even for a FREEHOLD project despite the “Bukit Timah Road” address, and especially when we were hardly impressed by the quality of furnishings.

In summary, FLORIDIAN will not be in our “shopping list” if we are looking for a new apartment in the Bukit Timah area. The Miami themed project with its unique enclaves may appeal to some, but we really do not think it represents good value for money. Even for investment (rental) purposes, the yield is likely to be reduced given the higher capital outlay. This is especially when you have to compete for tenants with the numerous new and old condominium projects within close proximity of FLORIDIAN.

View location and site plans here: http://s942.photobucket.com/albums/ad265/proptalk/

PARVIS (Transaction Update)

Below are details of transactions with contract dates between 9th - 15th December 2009, courtesy of today's The Business Times Weekend.

Contract Date  Built-in (sqft)    Price (S$'000)   PSF (S$) 
 10/12/2009            990                      1659               1676
 10/12/2009          1991                      2982               1498
 11/12/2009          1701                      2587               1521
 11/12/2009          1991                      3026               1520
 11/12/2009          1701                      2579               1516
 11/12/2009          1012                      1310               1294

PARVIS (Update)

We have received an email update from the marketing agent informing  us that only 18 of the 76 units of 4-bedrooms are left as of yesterday. The developers have also decided to increase prices for the Phase Two launch, which will happen in the coming weeks.

So for those eyeing 4-bedders in this project, it may be the time to act...

SOLEIL @SINARAN (Review)

District: 11
Location: Novena
Address: 2 & 6 Sinaran Drive
Developer: Fraser Centrepoint Homes
Tenure: 99-years Leasehold (wef 23/10/2006)

The wife and I started the New Year by visiting an “older” new project – SOLEIL @SINARAN. Actually we had wanted to see “Trevista” but found the sales gallery closed today. We were equally surprised to learn from the papers that units in SOLEIL are still available from the developer, as this project was launched way back in 2007 and was supposedly quite “hot” during that time.

SOLEIL – Inspired by life. Rising out of Sinaran, the twin heights of Soleil stands as testaments to the beauty and power of our sun. A highly reflective glass graces the S-shaped curves of both facades, brilliantly enhancing the varying spectrums of sunlight at different times of the day… At least this is what the marketing brochure says.

SOLEIL as you probably know by now, is located at Sinaran Drive. This is the road you turn into to get to the carpark at Novena Square if you are travelling on Moulmein Road. The project consists of two 36-storey towers with a total of 417 units. The site area is approx. 134,000sqft with a plot ratio of 3.5.

Urban legend has it that when SOLEIL was first launched during mid-2007, people actually queued outside the sales gallery a few days before the actual day of launch. An Indonesian buyer was said to have paid the first guy in the queue $42,000 to take over his queue number. We were told that today is the first day of launch for the last phase of this project – developer is now selling all remaining 44 “reserved units” (* read "left over" units *). These consists of

• 1-Bedroom: 506 – 581sqft (9 units)
• 2-Bedrooms: 936 – 1098sqft (11 units)
• 2-Bedrooms Loft: 1432 – 1464sqft (10 units)
• 3-Bedrooms: 1485sqft (2 units)
• 4-Bedrooms: 1722sqft (8 units)
• Penthouses: 4715 – 4950sqft (4 units)

As to be expected, SOLEIL is a full facilities condminium. So you will find the usual host of swimming pools, tennis courts, entertainment and spa pavilions – you can supposedly call to book a spa appointment with the appointed spa operator (Aramsa) and have your massage done in the spa pavilion.

There will be a total of 417 basement carpark lots, i.e. average of 1 lot/unit. We were reassured by the marketing agent that there will be more than sufficient carpark lots as many of the units will be tenanted to foreigners, who probably will not own a car. But somehow the wife and I do not really buy the argument – what about those residents that actually own 2 (or more) cars, which is not uncommon these days? You can also forget about visitor parking we presume.

The one unique facility worth mentioning is the “Sports Bar” located at the sky terraces on the 20th floor of each tower. Current plan is for these to be tendered out to external vendors, who will operate the bar & lounge facilities. So you do not have to step out of your estate to find a watering hole. But whether there are enough patrons to sustain the bars (assuming these are not open to the public) is a big question.

In terms of orientation, both the towers are East-West facing. All the 3 & 4-bedders and 2-bedroom lofts face “outwards” towards Moulmein Road and the City. The 1 and 2-bedders are “inward” facing, i.e. towards Novena Square, Balestier and Thomson. A massive new hotel cum medical centre is currently being built on a plot right behind SOLEIL. From our observation, most (if not all) the 1 & 2-bedder units that are located on 10th storey and below of both towers will have their views blocked by this new building.

Given that there is only 44 units left to sell, the showflats were already taken down. So we had to make do with a site model depicting the 2 towers and their facilities, as well as scale models of the various unit layouts.

What we like:
• The location – next to Novena & United Sq (amenities), 10 – 15 minutes’ drive to Orchard & CBD and with the Novena MRT Station almost at your doorsteps. These should translate to good rental returns for investors.

• If the scale models are anything to go by, the units are very regular in shape with few odd corners and space wastage. The bedrooms are all tucked to one side of each unit, away from the living/dining rooms and kitchen area.

• Although we cannot “feel” the actual living space you will get @SOLEIL without seeing the showflats, 1485sqft for a 3-bedder and 1722sqft for a 4-bedder do seem like decent-sized apartments.

• The 2-bedroom loft looks interesting, while its 1432-1464sqft is actually quite a good size. This is also bigger than similar loft unit we saw at “Cyan” (1300sqft).

• The whole penthouse unit is located on one floor. So you get over 4000sqft of space. The bigger penthouse units on the 36th floor even come with their own lap pools!

What we dislike:
• No laundry yard for the 1 and 2-bedroom units, although a washer/dryer is provided by the developer.

• The home shelter, which normally is the maid’s room, is located within the kitchen itself instead of the yard area. So the maid gets little privacy – she will either have to leave the door of the shelter open so that you can admire her sleeping pose whenever you decide to cook yourself some supper in the middle of the night, or close the door totally and risk suffocation.


• No window in the yard area of the 4-bedder units, which means no natural ventilation for laundry drying.

• We cannot identify any primary school within 1-km of SOLEIL.

• And the one that takes the cake: SOLEIL is located right across from Tan Tock Seng Hospital (TTSH) and Communicable Diseases Centre. Although this may come in handy should you, for example, dislocate one of your limbs from falling off the bed in early hours of the morning (* touch wood *),  it  is extremely bad Feng Shui (according to the wife) to stay next door to a hospital. This is because you are constantly surrounded by bad “qi” from the sick and dying. And if one hospital directly across the road is not bad enough, there will be a new medical centre located right behind your estate.

In terms of pricing, a 4-bedrooms unit on the 18th floor will cost you close to $2.79 million, This translates to around $1,620psf – rather high for a 99-years development, especially when you consider freehold projects like VIVA Residences that is just across the road is only selling at around $1600 – 1700psf even in the sub-sale market. This is despite the 5% rental yield that the marketing agent claimed that SOLEIL will fetch, which we are again sceptical.

The monthly maintenance for a 4-bedder (8-shares) is $320. This is surprisingly low compared to some of the other “similar size” projects that we have seen so far.

In summary, we felt that buyers of SOLEIL will mostly be for investment purposes – for rental to foreign tenants who value good convenience more than good Feng Shui, or for short lease purposes to medical tourists, e.g. those who come for medical treatments or procedures at TTSH or the new medical centre and require a place to stay for a couple of weeks/months.

View Site and Floor plans of SOLEIL here: http://s942.photobucket.com/albums/ad265/proptalk/Soleil/


If you have questions or interested to know more about SOLEIL @SINARAN,
please drop us your contact below:

foxyform.com

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