(1) Jackie Chan’s condo sold to OUE

District 9 The Grangeford in the Grange Road/Leonie Hill vicinity has been sold to Overseas Union Enterprise (OUE) at a unit land price of $1,810 per square foot per plot ratio, including a differential premium of $92.7 million payable for topping up the remaining lease to its original 99 years.

The 193 owners of Grangeford, including Hong Kong movie star Jackie Chan, will pocket a total of $625 million.

The Grangeford’s en bloc sale price of $1,810 psf is the highest price paid for a 99-year leasehold residential site in Singapore, surpassing the $1,104 psf ppr paid by a Wing Tai unit in June 1997 for a site in Draycott Park, which it has since developed into the Draycott 8 condo.

The Grangeford, opposite the back of Takashimaya shopping centre, has a land area of 130,982 sq ft. It is within 10-minute walk to Somerset MRT station.

(2) Pearlbank Apartments up for collective sale

Pearlbank Apartments, one of Singapore’s oldest condominiums built in 1969, has received the mandatory 80% majority consent to go for en bloc sale.

The asking price for the 82,376 sq ft site is $750 million which works out to be a unit land price of $1,445 per sq ft of potential gross floor area including an estimated $137 million in differential premium for extending the state lease to 99 years. There is no development charge payable.

The project comprises 280 residential units and eight commercial units.

(3) Horizon en bloc sale rejected by STB

In a terse two-sentence judgement, the Strata Titles Board (STB) threw out the application by the sale committee of Horizon Towers for a collective Sale Order. STB’s judgement was based on technical ground that some 'statutory requirements' had not been met by the applicants.

These may have included insufficient notices being posted on the premises and some documents not being filed properly.

Some 173 of Horizon Towers owners, or 84% of the share value, had signed the collective sale agreement (CSA) in February 2007 and consented to the en bloc sale to a consortium led by Hotel Properties Ltd (HPL) at the price of $500 million.

The HPL-led consortium is now suing the original batch of 173 sellers for breach of contract. The damages sought could be up to $1 billion from.

(4) En bloc craze subsiding

So far this year, a total of 50 en bloc sale sites were sold to the tune of $9.48 billion.

But, the largest property developer in Southeast Asia, CapitaLand believes that the en bloc sale craze may be on the wane as the market may not have the liquidity to support the escalating asking price.

CapitaLand has so far spent $13.49 billion on collective sale site in the preceding 12 months - the landmark acquisition being Farrer Court in the Holland Road area, which it combined with US-based Wachovia fund to plough a record $1.3 billion into the purchase.

Edited by Sam Gian
(Singapore's Independent Real Estate Trainer & Consultant)