Lakepoint condo eyeing en bloc sale, site bigger than Shunfu Ville

View of the Lakepoint condominium at Lakepoint Drive. (Photo: Jianwei Huang)

UPDATED: Owners of the ageing Lakepoint condominium near Lakeside MRT station are believed to be exploring opportunities to go en bloc in the next two years, or even earlier, according to some residents with knowledge of the matter.

PropertyGuru understands that a collective sale committee has been formed, and they are looking to appoint a marketing agent to do the groundwork and put a price tag.

Developed by Jurong Town Corporation and completed in 1983, the 304-unit project at Lakepoint Drive sits on an approximately 560,000 sq ft site and has a plot ratio of 1.4.

Unit types include studio apartments, maisonettes, penthouses and townhouses from about 915 sq ft to 3,247 sq ft. There are also five shops, a clubhouse and 400 parking spaces.

Located close to Singapore’s second CBD at the Jurong Lake District, the sprawling 99-year leasehold site is much larger than the 408,927 sq ft Shunfu Ville plot, which was sold collectively for $638 million to Qingjian Realty in May last year.

SEE ALSO: Qingjian acquires Shunfu Ville, plans to build over 1,000 homes

One resident, who wanted to be known only as Mr Tan, told PropertyGuru that discussions to sell the property have been ongoing for about 10 years.

He bought his unit for $340,000 in the 80s, but it is now valued at around $1.2 million. Based on recent en bloc transactions of privatised HUDC estates, he thinks each owner could receive close to $2 million.

“Earlier, fewer people were prepared to sell, but times change,” he said. “Now (the property) is almost 35-years-old. Many of the original owners have moved out and the composition of owners is now different.”

The more robust property market in recent months has also led to renewed interest in the site’s en bloc potential.

“At this stage, getting the consent of 80 percent of the owners is easy,” said Tan, who feels that the site has “huge potential”.

More collective sales expected

Meanwhile, analysts are seeing more collective sale committees being formed, especially after the high-profile sale of Shunfu Ville.

“We expect more projects to launch for collective sale this year and in the first quarter of 2018,” said Ian Loh, Executive Director & Head, Investment and Capital Markets at Knight Frank.

In fact, the marketing agent is gearing up to launch Dunearn Court in District 11 for sale on Thursday (27 July), and possibly Normanton Park in District 5 as early as next month.

“Market sentiment has picked up and sites trying for en bloc should expect keen interest,” said Loh, who reckons there could be 10 to 15 transactions this year.

Desmond Sim, Head, CBRE Research, Singapore and South East Asia, isn’t surprised that more homeowners are thinking of a collective sale.

“New projects are setting price benchmarks,” he said, adding that it is difficult for older developments to do the same given their “inelastic property values”.

At the same time, competition among developers for land is heating up given the cutback in Government Land Sales sites this year, pushing up land bids, said Sim.

Villa D’Este in Dalvey Road was recently relaunched for collective sale by CBRE at a guide price of $96 million. Other collective sale projects this year could include Cairnhill Mansions, Changi Gardens and Pearl Bank Apartments, noted Sim.

So far this year, there have been five collective sale transactions amounting to about $1.58 billion, compared to just three deals totalling over $1 billion for the whole of 2016.

Romesh Navaratnarajah, Senior Editor at PropertyGuru, wrote this story. To contact him about this or other stories, email romesh@propertyguru.com.sg