CDL Launching Balmoral Rd Condo Project

Source : The Business Times, July 17 2009

Preview of 437-unit Waterfront Key at Bedok Reservoir likely today too.

AFTER holding on to its Garden Hotel property at Balmoral Road for 10 years, City Developments Ltd (CDL) is finally launching an 85-unit condo project on the site.

A preview for staff and directors began yesterday, while sales to invited guests are slated to begin today.

Waterfront Key is a 99-year-leasehold condo with 437 units. Prices had not been finalised by last night, but market watchers reckon the cue will be taken from current pricing for Waterfront Waves next door, which they are selling at $680-$700 psf on average.

The average price of the 12-storey freehold condo Volari@Balmoral is understood to be about $2,000 per square foot (psf) for early birds. Market watchers say this is about 20-25 per cent below peak 2007 prices in the location.

The condo comprises two, three and four-bedroom units and penthouses. The two-bedders are about 1,325 sq ft, and based on the $2,000 psf average price, the lump sum investment would be about $2.7 million.

At Bedok Reservoir, Far East Organization and Frasers Centrepoint are expected to preview Waterfront Key today to staff, business associates and buyers who have registered interest.

Waterfront Key is a 99-year-leasehold condo with 437 units. Prices had not been finalised by last night, but market watchers reckon the cue will be taken from current pricing for the developers’ Waterfront Waves next door, which they are selling at $680-$700 psf on average.

The 405-unit condo, released early last year, is 78 per cent sold.

Back at Balmoral Road, it has been a decade-long wait for CDL, which bought Garden Hotel in June 1999 for $108 million from Kechapi Pte Ltd, controlled by the Chua family that once controlled Cycle & Carriage – now known as Jardine Cycle & Carriage. Garden Hotel comprises two four-storey wings. The original building was built in the early 1970s and the other wing was completed in 1983. The show suite for the Volari condo that CDL will develop on the site is on the fifth-floor rooftop of Garden Hotel, which is still operating but is likely to shut later this year. Garden Hotel has a site area of 102,200 sq ft.