Buyer & Seller Must Know

According to the director of the Institute of Real Estate Studies at the NUS, the stamp duty for property buyer is getting higher and this will end up affecting property prices. Recently, there was an announcement of around 1% price hike for the BSD at the budget 2018 meeting. This was something that surprised a lot of people, even those that are vetted with the industry as a whole.

There was an immediate effect and this came in the form of a 1.7% drop at the FTSE straits. This is a very important benchmark indicator for property developers. And it does show that the market does have some issues right now, issues that could potentially be solved if everything is handled correctly and with great results.

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FEC Properties is an indirect subsidiary of the Far East Consortium. The interesting thing about them is that they are securing a lot of properties right now, and the latest one for them is the Holland Road in District 10.

They paid around S$183.38 million, which is a lot of money. Just so you can better understand the value, we talk about 1703 Sing dollars per square foot per plot ratio. They are trying to create a high end residential development in here and they are indeed bringing in a whole bunch of great stuff to say the least.

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An old Singapore Condo in the heart of Orchard, Makeway View was successfully sold for $168 million March 2018.

This property was offered at the same price when it first was placed up for bidding in January.  The going price reflects the land rate of $1,626 per square foot per ratio and includes the approximate development charge of $21.26 million.

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A generous site located on Holland Road, which is capable of providing opportunities in both residential and commercial sectors, was just made available by the state. The Urban Redevelopment Authority offer a 99-year leasehold for this particular site, which is divided into two distinct zones, as mentioned earlier. Already some of the developers that want the site placed more than one bid to get it. Thus, the site managed to gather a total number of 15 bids so far. While the URA publicly released the name of the developers competing for the site, it did not provide any information concerning the value of their bids. Also, it is expected for the tender to last two months before the URA will decide which developer will win this site.

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The latest news coming out of Hong Kong, they are seriously considering imposing a tax on developers who are hoarding empty homes in order to bring down the furry in the housing market. The financial secretary told a talk show that the number of unsold units has increased significantly since 2017 which reached an all-time high over 9,500. The secretary did stress that they need to have a specific target in mind instead of attacking all properties on the market.

Hong Kong has the most expensive residential properties that have more than doubled over the past 10 years. This has caused a significant problem by not being able to keep up with the increasing demand for properties. A practice favored by developers has added to the situation by only selling new units in groups and constantly increasing the home prices during their releases.

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According to the Housing Development Board resale price index, the price of resale flats in Singapore have fallen for the second month in a row, yet the actual sale volumes of the flats have increased by a considerable amount. The pricing index back in February 2017 noted that the resale price was around 135; a year later and it shows that the resale price has dropped down to approximately 131.7. The executive director of ZACD Group, a real estate investment firm, noted that the slight dip in prices is not surprising.
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When something goes on in the communities of Singapore, such as the gathering of stalls at hawker centers and the organization of wet markets, many senior citizens are unable to participate. This is due to the fact that they move around by using wheelchairs or walking sticks, which makes the task of checking out the available stalls, placed in a crowded area or around wet floors, a mission impossible. Thus, until now, Singapore’s elders that had mobility issues had no other options but to stay away from these crowded events. But this doesn’t have to be a problem in our present days anymore, as there are ways to make these events enjoyable for senior citizens as well, regardless how they manage to visit the venue.

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By now, it’s no secret that the prices of condos in Singapore are going up. But, how much is up? Well, this February, these prices reached an increase of 1.9%, exceeding not just the increase of 1.3% that was recorded in January, but also the most significant increase recorded in the past 4 years. Thus, ever since 2014, in the month of January, the apartments and Singapore condominiums in Singapore that were put up for resale, did not record such important price increases. Specialists estimated an increase of only 1% in February, compared with January, but the market proved them wrong, as the increase was almost 2%.

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Over a weekend in March 2018, Hong Kong’s hot residential market reared its head, as a new housing development in Kowloon Wheelock & Co, was completely sold out. The development is made up of 750 units and they were 100% sold. There a huge buyer enthusiasm over the units, with over 9,800 applicants submitting for approval despite only having 750 residential units. This has shown that the housing market does not show any sign of stopping even though Hong Kong is the least affordable city in Southeastern China. To put this in perspective, Hong Kong’s housing prices have seen a three hundred percent surge since 2003.

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An outstanding property app was introduced by Desmond Lee, Second Minister for National Development. This app was designed with the purpose of enhancing the transaction services in the real estate industry. The RealHome app will be available for free on both Play Store and App Store.

RealHome is the perfect solution for contacting top real estate agents. This app is developed to make it easy to find experienced and qualified real estate agents. This app is headed by PropNex Realty, Huttons Asia, and ERA Realty with the aim to boost the standards of the real estate industry. Through this app, the customers may be able to review and rate agents. In order to provide authentic information to the users, the review will contain details such as the type of transaction and concise address of the property.

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According to an article in Straits Times dated 26th Feb 2018, Mr Yeoh who is a resident that needed to give up the canteen helper job a few years ago because he had a poor health, and he was actually diagnosed with cancer. The problem for him and his wife is that he had to move from a 5-room flat to a 2-room flexi flat and a 30 year lease came with that one. They are not the only people doing this.

Most seniors are downsizing right now, but it’s easy to see why. Not only do they want to avoid spending a lot of money, but they want to figure out a good, creative and professional way to handle with the shorter leases in a meaningful and powerful way. The best part about handling them this way is that it’s a lot easier for them to move into a smaller place.
Is it wise to give up your financial security and follow the type of dream that may never be able to pull of adequately? It can happen, but in the end the best thing that you can do is to identify the best options and just go ahead with them the best way that you can. This approach is quite good for old people that want to downsize.

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SCCB – Singapore Commercial Credit Bureau released a survey recently that showed an upward trend for a second consecutive quarter in local business confidence. As per the chief executive of SCCB, Audrey Chia, there will be certain downside risk prevalent during 2018; however, the overall growth outlook is expected to remain positive. She cited service-oriented and transportation sectors as the major factors that will lead the growth in 2018.

On the other hand, she believes that there are fewer chances of growth in the construction sector. This is due to the lacklustre performance expected in this sector in the near future. However, the overall trend is going to remain positive.

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Built somewhere in the middle of the 80s, Hollandia, which is a beautiful property located at the intersection of Queensway and Holland Road in District 10, was just won by FEC Properties as a result of a collective sale. The property has quite a potential when it comes to future developments, considering that at the moment it has 6 stories and a total of 48 flats to offer. FEC Properties, which is a subsidiary company owned entirely by Far East Consortium International, from Hong Kong, got the property for $183.38 million. The price was triggered by the value of the property’s square foot, which was $1,703 at the moment of the collective sale, as mentioned by Savills Singapore, the market agent that supervised the selling process.

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The collective market has seen another four freehold residential development sites of different region go on the market in Singapore for millions of dollars. The insatiable demand for development has taken the market by storm over the last few months, causing many residential properties to choose to sell their land. The four residential sites include the Asia Gardens which is in the central Singapore along Everton Road, Park View Mansions which is the West and is close to the Jurong Business District, Moulmein Rise, and Katong Omega Apartments.

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Bidding for sites across Singapore are very actively taking place across Singapore. Developers firmly believe that supply and demand for executive condominiums will drive bidding higher and higher. There is a great deal of speculation where this will go during this year. Some analysts are still quite skeptical and warning developers to slow down a bit. That said, developers are not sharing their views and believe the market is ripe for picking.

City Development Land Constellation, in joint-venture with TID Residential, won the bid for executive condominium site, setting the highest record for Executive Condo Land. The winning bid was a stunning $509.37 million, equating to $583 per square foot per plot ratio. This price was higher than anyone could have imagined and believed it’s due to a shortage of executive condos in Singapore. The executive condo site on Sumang Walk in Punggol brought in an astonishing 17 bids and closed on Tuesday. Acting as land sales agent, the site’s tender was conducted by the Housing & Development Board.

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