Tags: The Residences at W / The residences at W Singapore

Visit to Sentosa Cove: Quayside Isle & The Residences at W

- May 26, 2013 1 Comment

The wife and I decided to spend the Vesak Day long-weekend with our son on a "staycation" in Sentosa.

And between visits to the new "Adventure Cove" water park and iFly, we decided to go check out Quayside Isle at Sentosa Cove. This is the latest F&B hotspot across from One degree 15 Marina Club, which primarily serves those rich (and some famous) people that live in their villas and humongous apartments around Sentosa Cove.

 

For those who has not been to Quayside Isle (yet), the area has really blossomed into quite a hip and happening place, littered with many restaurants, bistros and bars. You will find some familiar names like Picotin and Brussels Sprouts as well as other quaint little joints.

 

 

And while dining at the restaurants, one gets the full view of the Marina with its many boats and crafts of various makes and sizes. 

 

The 240-room W Hotel, which opened its doors in September 2012, is located next-door to Quayside Isle.

And situated across the road from Quayside Isle is The Residences at W. This is the 228 units ultra-luxurious condominium project developed by CDL. Other than the usual frills, e.g. concierge service, valet parking, spa facilities etc., a total of 34 berths (that can accommodate yachts of up to 12-metre in length) are available for residents that own boats in addition to their fleets of Lamborghinis and Ferraris.

However, many of the apartments seem to be vacant from what we can see. But at an asking price of between $2,500 - $3,000psf, we are not overly surprised!

The number of vacant apartments became more pronounced as darkness fell. So we reckoned parking (for cars, that is) is not a major issue for residents at the moment.

 

 

 

 

 

Tags: cdl / city / d4 / leasehold / news / The residences at W Singapore

Developers snapping up own units

- April 14, 2010 No Comments

The ST reported yesterday that the sizzling property market is prompting even the developers themselves to snap up units in their new projects. This is especially for high-end properties.

Singapore Exchange filings show that at least four listed developers have sold units in their residential developments to relatives or “interested parties”. An interested party can be a director, a chief executive, a controlling stakeholder or one of their associates.

Among those listed in the ST report, it was said that the wife of CDL executive chairman has bought a third-floor unit in the 228-unit Residences at W Singapore Sentosa Cove for $4.6 million.



We have absolutely no issue with developers selling to their relatives and “interested parties” as long as such sales are transparent and aboveboard. Hey, if the wife and I are a property developer ourselves (one can always dream), we will also want to take care of our “inner circles”.

What really caught our attention was the fact that at the time of the option of purchase was granted, members of the public were being offered a 20% discount on this project! An additional 2% discount was offered to the company’s directors, including their spouses and children, under its preferential discount scheme for buying units in its developments, said CDL in its statutory filing. So Mrs Kwek Leng Beng had supposedly received a 22% discount.

To be able to afford a 20% discount… the wife and I wonder how much CDL is actually making out of Residences at W Singapore.

And for the benefits of those with the spare millions and seeking a “coastal” home in Sentosa, here are some details on Residences at W Singapore that we have managed to scamper together.

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Project:  Residences at W Singapore
Description:  Integrated development with retail outlets, hotel and private condominium residence under Starwood’s flagship “W” Hotels brand.
Developer:  City Developments Limited (CDL)
District:  4
Address:  1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11, 13 Ocean Way
Tenure:  99-years with effect from 31 Oct 2006
Site Area:  250,407sqft
Plot Ratio:  1.6
# of Towers:  7
# of Storeys:  6
# of Units:  228
Carpark Lots:  244 basement parking lots, excluding 2 buggy lots

Location Map


Unit Types & Sizes
• 2-Bedrooms Typical  (36 units):   1227 – 1259sqft
• 2-Bedrooms PES  (6 units):   1270 – 1292sqft
• 3-Bedrooms Typical  (70 units):   1625 – 1755sqft
• 3-Bedrooms PES w/Spa Pool  (16 units):   1948 – 2616sqft
• 4-Bedrooms Typical  (54 units):   2067 – 2131sqft
• 4-Bedrooms PES w/Spa Pool  (12 units):   2422 – 2486sqft
• Penthouse – 2-Bedrooms+Study  (4 units):   2217 – 2228sqft
• Penthouse – 3-Bedrooms  (12 units):   2508 – 2573sqft
• Penthouse – 4-Bedrooms  (10 units):   3240 – 3348sqft
• Penthouse – 4-bedrooms+Study  (3 units):   3972 – 3929sqft
• Penthouse – 5-Bedrooms  (5 units):   4898 – 6297sqft

Site Map


Pricing:  Between $2,500 - $3,000psf

Putting things in perspective,
                    20% = at least $500psf in discount!



The wife and I had originally wanted to check out Residences at W Singapore after our “Grill & Chill” Sunday lunch at The Capella last weekend. But our little son’s bout of stomach flu put paid to our dining plans. It looks like we’ll have to leave this one till next month. Meantime, the rich and well-connected continue to prosper...

Tags: collective sales / enbloc / news / The residences at W Singapore / The Seascape

Of developers' dwindling land banks and collective sales...

- April 6, 2010 No Comments

Below is a compilation of two reports featured in The Straits and Business Times respectively during the past two days, which the wife and I have found to be rather interesting.

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Major developers, caught by surprise by the strong home sales in the past year, are now faced with fast depleting land banks.

Research complied by property firm DTZ shows that out of 16 major developers in Singapore, half had less than 1,000 residential units left in their land banks as of end-February this year. Another five developers had between 1,000 and 2,000 units.

The numbers do not take into account strong home sales in March – which means that many developers’ land banks would have shrunk further by the end of last month.

Sales in March include all 202 units in Hong Leong’s 76 @Shenton. At Sentosa Cove, Ho Bee Investment recently launched Seascape, and City Developments, The Residences at W Singapore Sentosa Cove.

Analysts said that developers put off buying sites during the downturn in 2008-2009, when the outlook for the property market was bleak. Hence some were suddenly low on inventory when demand rose and they brought forward their launches.

The hunt for fresh residential sites has led to a spike in both the price and the number of bids for state land tender. In December last year, for example, a landed housing site at Jurong West put up for sale by the government drew a whopping 32 bids. The winning bid of $38.5 million, or $254 per sq ft of land area, came from Chappelis, a unit of Wee Cho yaw’s privately held Kheng Leong. At other tenders, the top bids were sharply higher than analysts’ estimates.

In response to the intense competition for sites, the government has in recent months stepped up land sales. More residential sites are also likely to be added to the second half 2010 government land sales programme. But the hunt for new residential sites is likely to continue unabated in the short term.

Boutique property group EL Development, which launched and sold-out a few high-profile projects last year, has just one more development (with 32 units) left in its portfolio. Other developers are similarly worse-off. DTZ’s research shows that Singapore Land had just 206 units left in its land bank as of end-February while Wheelock Properties had 209 units. Comparatively, UOL has 1,074 units left in its land bank, according to DTZ.

The 16 developers’ land banks amount to 21,886 units in all, which means that they hold over half of all the unsold residential supply in the pipeline.

Official figures from the Urban Redevelopment Authorities (URA) show that there were 34,234 unsold, uncompleted units of private housing in the pipeline as of end-2009. But this does not include projects without planning approvals.

For the year ahead, developers expect home sales to remain strong. Some 1,480 new homes were sold in January this year, followed by another 1,196 units in February – pushing the estimated number of new home sales in Q1 2010 to about 4,000 homes. Demand for new homes is expected to be around 3,000 units for the second quarter, analysts said.

The buying activity has however moved slightly to the high-end and luxury segments, where developers have a higher proportion of unsold units. That may work in some developers’ favor, as low land banks seem to be more of an issue for the mass market. For the high-end segment, developers still have ample supply because of all the collective sale sites they bought during the last boom.

And speaking of collective sales, more projects are expected to be put up for “en bloc” sale this year. This should bode well for developers keen to beef up their land banks especially in the mass market segment. But they are not rushing into the en bloc market just yet, experts say. This is because of the gap between what the sellers wants and what developers are prepared to pay. The prices en bloc sellers are asking now may not yet be justified by what the new projects nearby are fetching. Given a choice, developers would rather bid for government land sale sites than a private plot.

Government land sales sites are usually located in established residential areas with ready comparable projects, making it easier for developers to work out their sums. The sale process is also neater and faster, experts said. The collective sale process can drag on if there are strong dissenters.

Unhappy minority owners have, in the past, taken their estate’s collective sale case to the High Court and the Court of Appeal (e.g. Horizon Towers). This means that timing can be a big problem with collective sales.

In such a sale, both sides want to protect their interests. The developers would not want to bid too high in case the market does not turn out to be as strong as expected. But sellers want to secure a higher price to safeguard their position when the deal is sealed, in case prices continue to rise and they are unable to afford a similar replacement property.

Until prices of new private home launches improve further, the en bloc market may not take off in a significant way yet.
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On a related note, the wife and I wonder how much the prices of new private home launches will have to “improve further” before the bubble finally bursts…


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Tags: dakota residences / interlace / nathan suites / news / starlight suites / The residences at W Singapore / The Seascape / waterbank at dakota

Sales status of new projects and new launches

- No Comments

Following are extracted from BT today:

The Interlace
Over the Good Friday weekend, CapitaLand sold a total of 110 units at $850 - $1300psf. The property giant has sold more than 390 of the 490 units it has released to date in the 1040-unit, 99-year leasehold project.

The latest phase are priced about 3 – 5% higher than the phase one units released in September last year (at $850 - $1150psf) as there are more units in the recent batch on higher floors or with better facing.

Nathan Suites
TID Pte Ltd – a joint venture between Hong Leong Group Singapore and Japan’s Mitusi Fudosan – has sold 23 of the 40 units it released last week at its 65-unit Nathan Suites. The units fetched prices ranging from slightly below $2000psf to $2300psf; the average price achieved is $2100psf.

The 24-storey freehold project at Nathan Road , opposite the Malaysian High Commission, comprises two, three and four-bedroom apartments as well as penthouses ranging from about 915sqft to 4800sqft.

The Seascape at Sentosa Cove
Ho Bee and IOI have sold 6 units at The Seascape last week, taking total sales in the project to 31. The units cost $2619 - $2880psf.

The Residences at W Singapore
City Developments Ltd (CDL) sold another 5 units of The Residences at W Singapore Sentosa Cove, taking sales to 19 units. CDL is selling its development at $2500 - $3000psf.

Dakota Residences
NTUC Choice Homes and Ho Bee are left with about 50 units at Dakota Residences, comprising mostly four-bedders facing the Geylang River. The developers began selling the project, which has a total of 348 units, in June 2008 at about $970psf on average but trimmed prices by 5 – 8% during last year’s re-launch.

Waterbank at Dakota

UOL Group is expected preview its 99-year leasehold Waterbank at Dakota condo this week, which is also located along the Geylang River and next to the Dakota MRT Station that is slated to open later this month.

Prices are expected to range from above $1000psf to around $1300psf.

Market watchers say that this would be probably the first residential project to come on the market without bay windows and planter boxes, leaving more net liveable area for residents. A ruling that took effect on Jan 1, 2009 scrapped the exemption of these features from gross floor area for submissions for provisional permission.

UOL is expected to release about 200 of the project’s total of 616 units initially. Unit sizes range from 484sqft for a one-bedder to 2820sqft for a penthouse.

Starlight Suites
Tiong Aik group is expected to preview Starlight Suites at River Valley Close next week. The freehold 35-storey condo could be priced at about $2000psf on average. Starlight Suites has a total of 105 units, comprising one-bedders to a four-bedroom penthouse. Unit sizes range from 560sqft to 3401sqft.


And the property launch scene keeps on buzzing…

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