A Trip Down Memory Lane – Dakota Crescent

It wasn’t too long ago when the old estate of Dakota Crescent was still a familiar name among the older generations of Singaporean.

Today, the crowd is gone.

The residents have left for their new homes after the estate was chosen for the Selective Enbloc Redevelopment Scheme. What’s left behind are the dilapidated blocks of flats, empty playgrounds and sounds of silence from the past.

An important part of Singapore’s housing development history

The old Dakota Crescent estate was built in 1958 before the independence of Singapore, making it one of the oldest estate in Singapore. Developed by the Singapore Improvement Trust, a government organisation set up in 1927 by the British Colonial government to address the housing needs of the people in the early days. Dakota Estate was one of the developments undertaken and it was modeled after British towns.

Gone were the glory days. Let’s take a walk down the memory lane to indulge in the past of this beautiful little estate.

Should the Old Dakota Estate be conserved?

In the URA Master Plan 2014, the old Dakota Crescent Estate is zoned under residential use with a plot ratio of 2.8. The 15 blocks of flat are sitting on a big piece of land with an estimated land area of around 450,000 sq ft to 500,000 sq ft and if the entire plot of land is redeveloped into high rise residential development, there could potentially be 1,600 to 1,900 new residential units. If the land is sold for private condominium development, it could easily fetch between S$1.1 billion to S$1.4 billion for the government. From a dollars-and-cents perspective, the answer is obvious, isn’t it?

But what will we be giving up on for the sake of a S$1.1 billion to the government coffers? A unique piece of architecture work will be gone. A place that brought many nice memories to Singaporeans, will be gone. A place where families, bonds and kampong spirit were built, will be gone.

Most importantly, we will lose an important part of our heritage and history.

Is it worth it?

What can we do to conserve the Old Dakota Estate?

As much as we would like the estate to be conserved, a full conservation of the entire estate might not be the most efficient use of a prime piece of land if we put ourselves in the shoes of the planning authorities. Can a partial conservation be done so that government can extract the highest and best use of the land and yet keep the heritage and history of the old Dakota Estate intact?

DC Masterplan

The land where the old Dakota Estate sits on can be sub-divided into 3 plots. The biggest plot is the one along Old Airport Road and in between Dakota Crescent and Jalan Enam. In terms of land utilisation, this plot is the least utilised among the 3 plots, due to the generous greenery space in between the blocks. This piece of land is regular in shape and makes it easier for a developer to build. Hence, a lot of value and dwelling units can be created by redeveloping this piece of land.

The L-shape land beside the Mountbatten MRT entrance would probably be too precious to be used for conservation, given its strategic location. In the event, that government decides to rezone the park to residential use, it can be amalgamated with the L-shape land to form a bigger plot of land for development.

The last plot would be the one that is along Geylang River. This plot might probably be the most suitable for conservation. The 2-storey block 12 can be used for lifestyle and F&B retail trades with outdoor sitting along the river and the 7-storey block 18 can be refurbished and operate as a serviced apartment or hostel. Block 18 can also be used as a hub for the creative and art sectors due to its proximity to Goodman Arts Centre and National Arts Council. The small public carpark beside Block 12 can be retained for the retail/F&B customers.

The remaining block 26, 28 and 32 can be redeveloped into a small-scale residential development but it will be an added bonus if these 3 blocks can be conserved as well!

Let’s hope that our voices to conserve the old Dakota Estate are heard by the government and one day, the Dakota Estate can return to its glory days again!

Chevron House Acquisition – Another shrewd move by Oxley?

The Business Times reported today that Oxley is close to acquiring Chevron House in Raffles Place for S$660 mil, or S$2,526 psf on its net lettable area of 261,280 sq ft. Is this another shrewd move by Oxley? Or is Oxley overpaying for an old asset?

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Chevron House is a 32-storey building with 215,667 sq ft of offices (from level 6 to 32) and 45,613 sq ft of retail space (from basement 1 to level 4). The building has a remaining leasehold of 71 years. Chevron is the anchor tenant of the building, occupying 83,000 sq ft of office space over 10 floors and it will be moving to Duo Tower by 2020. The building is currently 98% occupied. There is an asset enhancement potential of 14,950 sq ft of unused GFA that the Oxley could tap on.

Buy in Year 2017, Pay Year 2011 Price

Chevron House was put for sale in the market in Year 2011 at a price tag of S$656.6 mil or S$2,500 psf. There were no takers for the property back then. Looks like Oxley is now paying the asking price in Year 2011 (though it is a property that is 6 years older now) without any price inflation!

Is the seller leaving money on the table for the new buyer?

For readers who work in CBD and familiar with Chevron House, you might be wondering if there is any space on the retail podium that can be used to create new GFA. The area looks built-up and any usable open spaces are already utilised for kiosks and promotion space. Whilst these spaces can be utilised to create new GFA for shops, it is uncertain whether the incremental return on existing revenue can justify the AEI costs for the creating of such shops. Slabbing over existing voids to create new spaces? It will probably be an expensive effort and once again the question is whether the returns can justify the costs. Probably, we would need some expert advice here who can suggest how to tap on this unutilised GFA.

The seller – Deka Immobilien had brought up this unutilised GFA when it was marketing the property in Year 2011. After a long period of 6 years, it has not done anything to tap on this unutilised GFA. Is the seller kind enough to leave money on the table for the new buyer? Or is it that this hanging fruit is too high up on the tree for anyone to pick?

Multiple strategic options for Oxley

In SPK’s view, Chevron House offers a lot of strategic options for Oxley. There is no immediate pressure to do anything to the property as the anchor tenant lease expires only in 2020. Oxley can enjoy net property income of around S$25 mil per year, which translate to a yield of 3.8% on its reported purchase price. Not a bad yield, considering residential are trading at around 3% yield today?

Oxley can also concurrently plan its asset enhancement initiatives for Chevron House over the next 2 to 3 years to revamp the common areas of the office and try to tap on the unutilised GFA.

The big payday will probably come at a time that is closer to the lease expiry of Chevron. Subject to the market conditions in 2019/2020, Oxley can opt to keep Chevron House as an investment property, subdivide and lease out the Chevron floors and higher rental rates. Alternatively, Oxley can strata-divide the building and sell the individual strata units. Or if Oxley has built up a substantial portfolio of income-producing assets, it can try to spin off all these properties into a REIT.

Does strata-selling the office units make sense? SPK does agree that based on Oxley’s acquisition price, the returns might not be fantastic. Oxley is unlikely to make the kind of 30% to 40% returns that Perennial made from selling AXA Tower and TripleOne Somerset. But nonetheless, considering the 3.8% yield that Oxley will be getting every year, this would have made the overall returns more palatable. And time is on Oxley’s side. Over the next 3 years, it can continue to enjoy the rental income while waiting for an upswing in office property prices.

Looks like time is on Oxley’s side for this acquisition.

Oxley has been a shrewd player in the Singapore property market. May its legacy continues with the acquisition of Chevron House!

Are the Developers ‘in two main camps’ or ‘in different factions within one single camp’?

It is always challenging to come out with a research that relies heavily on assumptions. Such reports can open up many questions on the underlying assumptions and data that support such assumptions.

BP_SunRosier_231117_2_0 — Sun Rosier – The most aggressive land bid year-to-date?

SPK reads the article published in the Business Times today, titled “Developers in two main camps over how much to bid for land”, with much interest. Without the benefit of reading the full report from JLL, there are a couple of questions floating in SPK’s mind.

Are the Developers ‘in two main camps’ or are they ‘in different factions within one single camp’?

This is probably a question relating to the use of words and language. The words ‘in two main camps’ seem to give readers the impression that there are major differences in opinion between the developers. This is probably a good attention catching headline. But if we take a step back and look at the bigger picture, the research is telling us that almost all the new future projects will be launched at higher prices from the current level. In this sense, the developers are probably aligned with their outlook and it is just a matter of how hungry they are to replenish their land bank and bid for land. It might be more appropriate to say that the developers are “in different factions within one single camp”?

How meaningful is the above-mentioned observation? Probably not much, since any developers who succeed in winning the bid would obviously hold an optimistic outlook of the market. If not they would not have bid so high for the land, isn’t it?

What might be a more meaningful study? Probably a study of the winning bidders against the losing bidders, or a study of the active participants in the collective sales market or GLS tender against those developers who have sit out of the recent tender biddings.

Challenges in doing a market comparison on an adjusted basis

To be fair, a lot of effort has been made by JLL in making sure that the comparison of future launch price of new projects against 2017 transacted prices of comparable projects is done as accurately as possible. JLL has adjusted existing transacted prices for differences in age, tenure, location and median unit size. SPK applauds the team for the commendable effort.

But without the benefit of reading the full report from JLL, some questions might come to readers’ mind. How ‘comparable’ are those existing projects against the new projects? How are the 2017 transacted prices adjusted? What is the methodology for the adjustments?

Another question to consider is whether the study has taken into the account of the “market anomaly” of resale units selling at discounts to new launches. Should we factor this into the study to find out the ‘resale discount’-adjusted price increase?

Or should we also compare the expected launch price of these 26 future new projects against each other and also against the recent new launches?

These additional studies might give us further insights on the outlook for the market.

Capitol Singapore Lands In Controversy Again

The Straits Times reported that Russian tycoon – Mr Sergey Vbornov is suing the developer of Eden Residences Capitol Singapore (a JV between Perennial and Pontiac) for the return of more than S$10 million that he paid for a 314 sqm unit in the project. He claims that the unit is “unfit for habitation and does not comply with the promised luxury standard”, nor did it live up to the idea of “paradise found”, as allegedly marketed.

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Capitol Singapore – A development marred by controversies and lawsuits

This lawsuit probably brings the level of controversy at Capital Singapore to another level. Things hadn’t been that smooth sailing for the consortium developers. Faced with internal fights between shareholders, delay in the opening of the 6-star Patina Hotel, weak shopper traffic, this lawsuit adds on to the list of issues that the developer is facing.

It is a pity that one of the most iconic places in the history of Singapore has turned into such a sorry state without fulling its fullest potential. This might have put a black mark on the sterling track records of industry veteran – Mr Pua Seck Guan, who is also the CEO of Perennial.

Probably not the best way to defend a case?

Lawyers from A&G, who were defending the developer, claimed that the unit was not sold under the agreement as a “luxurious apartment” and/or “paradise found”. Well, technically, A&G is correct as probably no developer would put in its SPA such ambiguous and open-end claims that could potentially result in liabilities in future. In addition, developers would have put a lot of disclaimers in fine prints in their sales brochures to disclaim against whatever that is being shown in the brochures.

Looks like it is a tough case for the buyer to fight using his argument. But if his intention is to damage the developer’s reputation, he might have succeeded. This would also serve as a good reminder to all buyers to take what you read or see on sales brochures with many pinches of salt.

Whilst A&G is probably correct in their argument, SPK thinks the argument could have a negative impact on the developer’s businesses and reputation in future. Are they telling people not to believe what they put in their marketing brochures? Are they telling people that a S$3,000 psf apartment is not necessarily a “luxurious apartment”? If a S$3,000 psf apartment isn’t a “luxurious apartment”, then what could it be? A mass market apartment?

They might succeed in winning the case, but what about the developer’s reputation? A case of winning the battle but losing the war?

Quality of Development is the heart of the issue

Without in-depth knowledge of this case, it is difficult to ascertain which party is right or wrong, or what kind of misunderstanding might have happened in between. Was it a case of poor workmanship? Is the buyer unreasonable? We will probably find out more when the case goes to trial next year.

But once again, this case highlights the critical issue of quality of developments, which is something that SPK brought up in his earlier post (“Are Singaporean property buyers discerning enough?”).

Let’s hope that Capitol Singapore can shed away all the negative publicities one day and return back to its former glory soon!

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Jalan Besar Plaza Collective Sales – What went wrong?

It was probably 3^rd time unlucky for the owners of Jalan Besar Plaza.

The Business Times reported that no bids were received for the property at the close of the enbloc tender on 10^th November 2017. However, there was an expression of interest from a developer to purchase the property.

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An attempt that is doomed to fail from the start?

It is probably no rocket science to guess why there was no bidder for Jalan Besar Plaza despite the enbloc craze. Owners were asking for S$390 mil or S$2,170 psf ppr for this freehold mixed-use development. Whilst the price quantum is still within the investment appetite of most developers, its high per square foot price would probably mean very little (or no) profit potential and higher risk for a developer to redevelop this place.

Based on SPK’s estimation, a new development on the site will have a breakeven price point of around S$2,800 psf to S$2,900 psf. Such a pricing might still be achievable if the developer can strata-sell small retail units, like what we had seen a few years back in the early 2010s. But with the strata-retail resale market as good as dead now, this leaves developers with one less trick in their bags and hence making it more difficult for developers to achieve the required selling price to justify the high enbloc acquisition price.

At this asking price, SPK believes that it will be a tough sell for the owners of Jalan Besar Plaza.

Hopefully, the owners can strike jackpot if they can conclude a deal with the developer that expressed interest in the property. Anyway, there is probably no pressure for owners to sell since they are sitting on a freehold land. Owners can always sit back and wait for a good offer to come. But let’s hope they will not wait too long for it!

Keep calm and carry on waiting!

Are Singaporean property buyers discerning enough?

It was reported in the Sunday Times this morning that a piece of concrete fell 40 storeys from the roof of a Design, Build and Sell Scheme (DBSS) project – Trivelis in Clementi and landed on the playground below. The incident happened last Thursday. Thankfully, nobody was injured in this incident.

Trivelis Playground — Source: Straits Times

Interesting (Amusing) comments from various parties on the incident

It was a very unfortunate incident, but the comments by different parties were pretty interesting (amusing) in SPK’s opinion.

Firstly, the developer, EL Development, claimed that ‘lightning struck the rooftop of Block 311C, resulting in a piece of concrete dislodging from the precast concrete façade’.

Wow! It probably sounded as if EL Development either had a 24-hour monitoring system at the rooftop of Trivelis, to be able to detect and record a lightning striking the rooftop at any time, or the developer has stationed someone at Trivelis on 24-7 basis to report any unusual sightings. Or maybe the developer has a team of forensic experts in meteorology to certify its claim. Looks like the security at Trivelis is well-covered (and probably at the expense of the privacy of residents)!

Anyway, putting jokes aside, let’s give EL Development the benefit of doubt that what it claimed was true. The next comment that makes SPK ponder much would be the statement from town council that outrightly refuted EL Development’s claim, saying that the town council did not share the developer’s view on the cause of this incident. This strongly-worded comment doesn’t sound like a typical PR statement that would usually claim that ‘investigations are going on and no further comments could be given’.

So what is going on behind the scene? SPK doesn’t know and could only try to second guess here.

Are Singaporean property buyers discerning enough?

This incident brought up one question in SPK’s mind – Are Singaporean property buyers discerning enough on the quality of the projects that they are buying?

Most of the time, buyers go into a show flat, looking at location, layout, facilities, amenities, finishing materials, unit provision and pricing etc. Probably one of the last things that come to their mind is the quality of the project.

With the strict rules and regulations in Singapore, property buyers might have taken things for granted and trust that the authorities like BCA or URA would have probably taken care of any quality-related issues during the TOP inspection.

EL Development is not new to controversies. As reported in the news articles, there were already reported complaints on defects in Trivelis back in 2015 and in 2016, there was also news report about residents at La Fiesta complaining about defects and over-sized aircon ledges in the development.

Well, to be fair, defects are common in new developments and developers typically are able to rectify and satisfy the complaints of customers. But it is quite rare for buyers to take these issues out to the public. For the buyers to do so, it might reflect a lot of the frustration and dissatisfaction that they had during the rectification process.

Did such negative reports result in any impact to the developer? It does not seem so! EL Development’s latest project Parc Riviera at West Coast is still selling like hotcakes! 657 units out of the total 752 units have been sold to date, a year after its launch.

All the best to the buyers.

So, is it time for Singaporean buyers to be more discerning on the quality of condominiums that they are buying?

Are Vista Park owners hitting their jackpot this time round?

Vista Park owners have jumped on the enbloc bandwagon and launch the tender for enbloc sale today. Vista Park sits on a big plot of rectangular-shaped land with an area of 319,250 sq ft. The site has a plot ratio of 1.4 and height limit of up to 5 storeys. Maximum potential plot ratio (before bonus) would be around 446,951 sq ft. The site has a remaining leasehold of 61 years and the buyer will have to pay a lease top-up premium of S$66 million to top up the leasehold to 99-year.

Vista Park owners are asking for at least S$350 mil, which translates to S$969 psf ppr. If bonus GFA is included, price per plot will reduce to S$903 psf ppr. Each owner could take back S$1.16 mil to S$3.5 mil, and this is 60% more than what they can sell in the market.

Vista Park

News report on Vista Park enbloc can be read here.

Vista Park will be an interesting and yet challenging project for developers

Why does SPK say so?

If you look at Vista Park’s location, it seems to lack the factors to sell, such as proximity to MRT and transportation, amenities, shopping centres and schools etc. But let’s not discount the location too soon yet. Vista Park does have some unique attributes, such as its proximity to nature, exclusivity of the estate and unique hill location that offers Pasir Panjang container port views (for port lovers?).

The typical build-small-and-sell-cheap strategy may not work for this site as the location would not be particularly attractive to investors and there could also be potential issues relating to the new policy relating to traffic impact on surroundings (SPK shall discuss more on this in the next section).

Primary target market would probably be the well-to-do families staying in the surrounding landed estates, upgraders in the neighbourhood, and nature lovers. Hence, this project may require an experienced and creative developer who can come out with an interesting product to leverage the uniqueness of the location. And this would probably mean that there might not be strong competition among developers for this site, since there are so many enbloc sites to choose from and some developers would probably go for the easier-to-sell enbloc sites.

Any potential issue from the traffic impact assessment?

Access to Vista Park is via the 2-way road (single lane each way) – South Bouna Vista Road. As SPK had flagged out in his previous blog post, Vista Park seems to fall into the category that is considered at higher risk of facing restrictions in the allowable number of new units in redevelopment.

Vista Park Road

Having said so, is this a cause for concern?

Not really if the developer is not going to build to the maximum number of units and this is likely to be the case for the buyer of Vista Park if the project is positioned for owner stay rather than for investment. A sigh of relief for Vista Park owners?

Can developer still make money after paying S$350 mil for the site?

Yes, SPK would think that it is possible. SPK estimates that the breakeven price for the redevelopment of Vista Park would be in the region of S$1,350 psf to S$1,400 psf. A nearby comparable project would be the recently launched 24 One Residence, a freehold 24-unit development by Tee Land. This project was sold at around S$1,630 psf on average. If we assume that the redevelopment of Vista Park is being sold at S$1,650 psf which is at premium considering its size and probably a unique positioning of the project that could more than compensate the premium of 24 One Residence’s freehold status, the developer could potentially make a nice profit margin of 15% to 18%! Not bad isn’t it?

Thumb’s up or down?

Yes, SPK would probably give the potential enbloc of this project a thumb’s up. Good luck to all the Vista Park owners!

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What is the October developers’ sales data telling us?

URA released the latest October data on prices of private residential units sold by developers. No major surprises from the headline data, but let’s put on our analysis hat and dig deeper to gather further insights from the data!

Developers’ housing stocks are clearing up at a very rapid pace

In October, developers sold some 969 new private residential homes and executive condominiums (ECs), an increase of 7 percent from September. Yes, nobody mentions that this was 37% lower than the same period last year since such a statistic is meaningless to talk about during a time when everyone is talking up the property market. (Just an interesting point for everyone to note!).

If we talk about non-landed private residential sales (i.e. excluding ECs and Landed), a total of 727 non-landed private residential units were sold during the month. But, what is probably more interesting to note (other than the headline sales figure), is that developers’ unsold inventory is clearing up at an alarmingly fast pace. Considering that there were only 242 units being launched in October, the implied take-up rate of new condo units is at 300%! This means that the monthly new units release by developers are not able to satisfy the demand of home buyers and older stocks are now selling very rapidly!

Number of unsold units have reached multi-year low

As at end of October, developers were left with only 6,670 non-landed private residential units to sell. Out of these 6,670 units, 2,296 units are from projects that have already been launched and ready for immediate purchase. There are 1,758 unreleased units from launched projects and the remaining 2,616 units (Parc Botannia included) are from future projects that have not been launched yet.

To have a better view of how the market had moved, let’s go back to the beginning of 2017. At that time, there were close to 13,000 unsold non-landed units and within a short span of 10 months, the number of unsold units has declined by half! If we go further back in time to 2015 and 2016, the number of unsold units were in the range of 15,000 to 20,000 units at any point in time. Talking about the current supply crunch? Yes, it definitely looks real.

Supply of private homes to double. So what?

My apologies for sounding too complacent in my headline. But let’s not consider this statement ‘supply of private homes to double’ at face value and try to understand in its complete picture.

On first look, this statement looks pretty worrisome but let’s not forget that this ‘doubling’ of supply is actually coming from a low base now. If we talk about supply doubling from developers’ existing unsold stock of 6,670 units, this would mean that future supply could go up to 13,000 units. Is this a major cause of concern? Not when historically our unsold inventory is around 15,000 to 20,000 units. This doubling of supply would probably bring us back to where we started at the beginning of 2017, in terms of housing supply.

What is the list of immediate future new launches telling us?

So, what are the big new launches that might happen in the near future? We have already witnessed the launch of Parc Botannia, that moved 230 units over the last weekend. Some of the other possible bigger new launches in the near future would include 1) 8 Saint Thomas (St Thomas Walk; 250 units); 2) South Beach Residences (Beach Road; 190 units); New Futura (Leonie Hill Road; 124 units); and Parksuites (Holland Grove Road; 119 units). These are projects with more than 100 units for sale.

There is one striking observation from the above statistics. There is no mass market new launches in the immediate pipeline! This is likely to create a pent-up demand and probably some of the enbloc sites might be able to catch this demand if they time their launch early.

Looks like better times ahead? Keep Calm and Carry On!

Raising the bar for Collective Sales: Who are the winners and losers?

It is reported in the Business Times and the Straits Times today that with immediate effect, potential buyers, interested parties, developers or real estate agencies acting on behalf collective sales committee are required to consult the Land Transport Authority (LTA) and submit a Pre-application Feasibility Study (PAFS) on traffic impact to ascertain the number of units they can build, before submitting an Outline Application or Development Application to URA for the redevelopment of a collective sale site.

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Will this new measure derail the enbloc boom?

There is no doubt that this new measure is going to create an additional hurdle and process for the developers/owners to acquire/sell collective sales sites going forward. But let’s not forget the key fundamental that has led to the resurgence of enbloc trend so far, which is developer’s shortage of landbank. Will a developer put on hold its collective sale acquisition plans and run the risk of doing no business over the next few years? Probably not, when they have their families and staff to feed.

What is the true cost of this new measure to developers?

With so many old developments gunning for enbloc now, the current collective sales market is a ‘buyer’s market’. Developers have a lot of options to choose from. As the Business Times article rightfully pointed out, the cost and responsibility of engaging a traffic consultant to assist in the PAFS submission and approval could ultimately shift to real estate agencies marketing the sites and the owners of the collective sale sites. Owners probably wouldn’t want to be ‘penny wise, pound foolish’ in this instance, when they could potentially reap millions in profit by spending a small sum of money to prepare a traffic impact assessment to for potential buyers.

So what is the true cost of this measure to developers? Probably zero (and comes with a free TIA report)!

Are there winners and losers from this policy change?

Of course, there are!

Collective sale sites located in landed estates with only a 2-way road (single lane each way) are at high risk of facing restrictions in the allowable number of new units in redevelopment. This is, in fact, nothing new as the government had already introduced measures in the past to curb the intensity of developments in some landed areas such as Telok Kurau, Kovan, Joo Chiat and Jalan Eunos.

Typically, such developments are small in land area and they come with limited facilities. Hence, developers tend to keep the unit size as small as possible in order to keep price quantum attractively low but yet selling at a high per square foot price. To do so, developers need to be able to build as many units as they can at the smallest possible size to achieve their business objective.

In the event that developers are not allowed to build to the highest potential number of units, this means that developers have to build less units that are bigger in sizes (in order to maximise the GFA) and sell at a higher price point. It would probably be difficult to attract buyers in such a scenario and the risk to developers will be significantly higher.

So what will the developers do?

It will be business as usual, but developers will now probably chase for better located collective sale sites that have better access to public transportation, MRT and located along multiple-lane roads or near expressways (in general). Such sites have a better chance of clearing the LTA on traffic assessment impact requirements. With a re-direct of resources towards such sites, the chance of collective sale success for sites with better traffic access seems to be higher with this new policy.

It will be interesting to observe the outcome of some of the collective sale tenders over the next few months to assess whether this policy change has any effect on developer’s strategy.

Bloomberg says Singapore’s Property Market is set to sizzle! Are you excited?

Singapore’s Property Market Is Set to Sizzle

What an attention-grabbing headline from Bloomberg. How do you feel after reading the headline? As a homeowner, you may be feeling good that you are sitting on a property that looks set to increase in value the next year. As a home seeker, you may be rushing to hunt down your dream home before prices are set to increase.

Yes, that is the power of media and herd instincts.

Putting the psychological impact of the article aside, let’s take a look at some of the salient points in the article:

Singapore’s residential and office market has passed its inflexion point, embarking on an exciting recovery journey
With brighter economic prospects and improved market sentiment in the next two to three years, developers are increasingly sourcing land sites to ride the wave of growth for the rest of the decade
Home prices could rise as much as 10 percent next year, according to analysts from Morgan Stanley, BNP Paribas SA and UOB Kay Hian
With housing-affordability much better in Singapore, there may be a surge in demand next year
Singapore’s property market has largely turned the corner, underpinned by a brightening economic outlook

Read full article here.

Do you agree?

Well, at this point in time, SPK agrees with the article that there are a lot of positive signals in the market that are pointing towards a rising property market for at least the next year. Improvement in economy and job market, wealth creation through collective sales, positive sentiments driven by stock market highs and news headlines, herd instincts, family formation/upgrading and an extended period of low and competitive mortgage rates are probably to stir buying interests in property. But nonetheless, it is important to watch out for red flags in the economy and the market.

Property cycles are getting shorter these days and it is important to ride the cycle at the early stage and not ending up being the one without a seat in a game of musical chair.