Trillium sold at around $1700

Lippo has priced its Trillium freehold condo opposite Great World City at an average of about $1,700-plus per sq ft, with the range of prices for the 29-storey development from about $1,600 psf to just under $2,100 psf.

The group has secured enough interest in the 231-unit condo to sell off everything, with many buyers indicating interest in multiple units. ‘There are a few families from overseas wanting to buy three, four, five or even six apartments - one for each child,’ Lippo Group deputy chairman Stephen Riady told BT yesterday.

‘These are high net-worth buyers that we know from the region - Indonesia, Malaysia, Hong Kong, mainland China, Taiwan. But we may have to ask them to buy fewer units, as we’d like to have a wider spread of buyers so more people can come into the showflat and see the quality of our product.’

On the Kim Seng Plaza site next door, which the group bought late last year, Lippo plans another luxury condo, perhaps with 100-110 units, which it hopes to launch towards the year’s end.

Orchard Residences sets new record at $4000

A Singaporean businessman is said to have paid a benchmark price of over $4,080 per square foot, working out to over $17 million, for a 53rd level penthouse at The Orchard Residences earlier this week. This beats the previous record of $3,450 psf set in December last year for a penthouse at the Marina Bay Residences, which also has a 99-year leasehold tenure.

In the case of Orchard Residences, which will rise above Orchard MRT Station, the $4,000 psf mark has been crossed not just for the penthouse deal, but also for several other apartments on the upper floors.

About half of the 175 units in the condo, spread across low, mid and high floors, are being released under the initial phase, which is for sale by invitation.

The lowest price achieved in the condo is said to be close to $2,600 psf.

The developers seem to have screened potential buyers to give preference to genuine home buyers and investors rather than property speculators.

Waterfall Gardens homes selling well

MCL Land has sold 100 units at its freehold Waterfall Gardens condo at an average price of about $1,450 per square foot. Prices achieved for the 12-storey condo range from about $1,300-plus psf to $1,650 psf, Mr Koh said.
This project has 12 penthouses, of which eight have been sold. The most expensive unit, measuring 4,844 sq ft, was sold for $7.9 million. It will have a rooftop pool and entertainment area. The remaining units in the development are three- and four-bedroom apartments.

The developer bought the nearly 161,000 sq ft site in February last year for about $550 psf of potential gross floor area.

Minority homeowners suffer in enbloc sales

The rising price of replacement property is dampening the spirits of some owners in en bloc sales, even though the compensation they get from these collective deals is usually much more than if they had sold on an individual basis.

Gillman Heights condo resident Alan Khew is downgrading to an HDB flat. He wrote to AsiaOne to lament that he could not afford to live in private housing anymore, despite the fact that the largest residential en bloc sale in Singapore earned him about 50 per cent more than if he had sold it on the open market himself.

Mr Khew, 42, an IT consultant who bought his three-bedroom unit there for $560,000 in 2000, reckons that the $900,000 sales proceeds will not be enough for him to buy another condo in the same area of Alexandra. A quick check of the Classified ads shows that similar sized, 99-year leasehold condo apartments in District 4 are all above $1 million.

He said: "I have become worse off. With the proceeds, my only choice is to downgrade to a HDB. I am now forced to sell my condominium apartment with swimming pool and clubhouse facilities to downgrade to a smaller HDB apartment."

Another disgruntled seller, who is moving from his condo in the Newton area to a 5-room HDB flat in Dover after an en bloc sale, will miss the convenience of living a stone's throw away from Orchard Road.

Said the 61-year-old bachelor: "For a person who doesn't drive, this is an important consideration. The proposed en bloc offer - while triple the price I had originally paid - will not, however, be enough to purchase a similar place in the same neighbourhood. I may be able to rent a condo in the same area for now. But will rents continue to be this cheap forever - or at least for my lifetime?"

Savills Singapore's director of business development and marketing Ku Swee Yong observed that as en bloc deals spread, more sellers from these properties will downgrade.

"Collective sales are expected to continue at this pace. The sellers have to look for replacement unit but by the time they receive their money, the prices of similar accomodation would have risen in this bullish market. In particular, those who are nearing their retirement age will not be willing to overspend and borrow from the bank, and instead will move to cheaper housing," said Mr Ku.

More enbloc deals done outside Orchard

Despite big publicity for a few prominent sales, most of the en bloc deals so far this year have been outside the Orchard Road area, property advisers Jones Lang LaSalle said yesterday.

Since the start of this year, there have been 17 collective sales totalling $2.43 billion. And of these, 13 deals adding up to $1.59 billion were outside the prime Orchard Road belt - or 65 per cent of the islandwide tally of $2.43 billion.

JLL said the total islandwide tally of en bloc sales so far this year was notably bigger than the 14 deals worth $1.3 billion recorded in Q1 last year. The figure for the first two-and-a-half months of this year nearly matches the $2.41 billion for the whole of 1999, which was a record year at the time. That full-year record was surpassed by last year’s figure, of $7.75 billion comprising 62 collective sale deals.

Examples of en bloc sales sealed this year outside the Orchard Road area include Gillman Heights at Alexandra Road ($548 million, setting a new record for a collective sale in absolute dollar terms), Minton Rise in Hougang, Hong Leong Garden Condominium in the West Coast location, Seabreeze Apartments in Joo Chiat and Flamingo Valley in Siglap.

Mr Lui expects the ‘filtering effect to the secondary areas’ to strengthen further this year. ‘As Singapore continues to establish itself as a global city, a more diversified population, with different housing preferences, will emerge. Demand for residential units will remain strong but will not be concentrated just in the prime districts,’ he said. ‘Projects in secondary areas with good accessibility will begin to take the spotlight on the collective sale platform.

‘At the going rate, we may even see another record set in the secondary areas, especially those around the East Coast districts that are near or along major transportation routes.’ JLL observed that an increasing number of new collective sales sites are emerging in secondary areas such as Farrer Road (such as Leedon Heights and Tulip Gardens), Palm Beach Gardens and Ocean Apartments in the East Coast vicinity, and Concorde Residences, Bright Building and Balestier Court in the Thomson area.

Far East focusing on high end

Far East Organization will pay more attention to the high-end property market, which has grown too big to ignore, says CEO Philip Ng.

‘Today, this very wealthy segment of the market has grown too significant to ignore. We must therefore augment our organisational machinery, in terms of our product development and sales and marketing capabilities, to address this,’ Mr Ng says in the group’s in-house publication Landmark.

More enbloc sites

Colliers International yesterday offered a Killiney Road site for sale via an expression of interest - the same site offered for sale by tender last June. The site is Killiney Apartments.

Cushman & Wakefield (C&W) is handling the sale by tender of Pender Court, a residential apartment block minutes from the future Sentosa integrated resort (IR).

Pender Court is in Wishart Road within walking distance of HarbourFront MRT Station. The site area is 65,500 sq ft, with a plot ratio of 1.4.

apartments at The Caribbean @ Keppel Bay are going at $1,500-$1,600 per sq ft’.

As for how much the 40,348 sq ft Killiney Road site is expected to fetch, Colliers International director for investment sales Ho Eng Joo said: ‘The indicative sale price is around $1,000 per sq ft per plot ratio, inclusive of development charge, or about $115 million’.

All buy one Sky@Eleven options exercised

All options except one to buy units at Sky@eleven have been exercised

When the condo was launched in January, all 273 units were snapped up within 30 hours at an average price of $975 psf

Options for all units except one four-bedroom apartment were exercised.

10% of One North Residences sold

About 10 per cent of apartments at the 405-unit One North Residences have been sold so far this week at prices of $800 to $900 per square foot

The good response means that United Engineers (UE), which was originally planning to launch its nearby 368-unit One Rochester later this month, can now be expected to push out the project quite soon. With One North Residences setting the tone, One Rochester will likely be launched at prices higher than the $800-$900 range

Enbloc fever goes on

Newcomers: Himiko Court at Mt Sinai, Green Meadows in Upper Thomson, Eden Spring at Balmoral Rd, and an old block of apartments at 396 to 398 River Valley Rd are the latest offerings.

The $348 million asking price for Himiko Court works out to a unit land price of about $850 psf of potential gross floor area, inclusive of an estimated $1.07 million development charge.

Eden Spring’s asking price is $53.5 million - or $1,050 psf per plot ratio including an estimated $3.7 million DC.

Green Meadows's reserve price is in the $250 million-$260 million range - working out to $392 to $408 psf ppr. No DC is payable for the site.

Lastly, some old block of apartments at 396 to 398 River Valley Rd. The ‘indicative guide price’ of $36.5 million reflects a $700 psf ppr inclusive of an estimated $130,000 DC

In search for a bargain apartment near Orchard

Given the maddening pace at which land prices in the Orchard area has been rising, many has given up hope of finding bargains near Orchard.
However, there are still some affordable enclaves near Orchard.

These include
River Valley,
Stevens Road,
Balmoral,
Robin Road.

Popular choices are Avalon (Anderson Road), Belmond Green (Balmoral), Urbana (River Valley), Proximo (Robin Road)

Anderson 18 owners hit jackpot

Owners at the Anderson 18 condominium stand to gain about $6.75 million for their units from the collective sale of their prime Ardmore area development.

The price represents a huge jackpot, given that the last unit sold at the condo reaped a low price of $3.4 million last May.

The en bloc buyer is a joint venture of City Developments (CDL) and Wing Tai, which will pay $477.7 million for the 10,414 sq m freehold estate.

Anderson 18’s total price works out to a land value of $1,650 per sq ft (psf) of potential gross floor area, above the $1,369 psf price achieved for the neighbouring Ardmore Point last October.

The sale of Anderson 18 makes it the second most expensive residential site in Singapore, after The Parisian in Angullia Park, which has a price tag of $1,735 psf of potential gross floor area.

Suites@Cairnhill

Here's a new project that has recently been launched.
19 Stories. 3-4 bed-rooms available.
Details will be posted once I have them. At the mean time, here are some pictures of the development.