Tender For Anson Road Site Closed

Source : The Strait Times, 29 August 2007

THE tender for a 99-year-old office plot on Anson Road closed yesterday with local-based Firstoffice lodging the highest bid of $237.2 million.
It outbid Mapletree Lighthouse Trust trustee VivoCity, which offered $201.7 million, and Winglow Investment, which bid $159.8 million.

The Firstoffice price works out to $941 per sq ft per plot ratio (psf ppr), which is below the $1,021 psf ppr a Mapletree Investments unit paid for a larger plot nearby last month.

Mapletree also had to beat four rival bidders for that plot; only three bidders contested the latest tender.

But industry experts say this is not an indication that the property boom is starting to lose its fizz.

For one, the earlier site is 39,733 sq ft compared with the latest plot's 27,281 sq ft.

Property consultancy Knight Frank's head of research and consultancy, Mr Nicholas Mak, said the two locations also differed in their appeal.

'The latest site is triangular in shape and one side faces a carpark and a large exhaust pipe from International Plaza.

'Even if the owners choose to build higher, the occupants would still end up looking into the offices of International Plaza just 20m away.'

CBRE Research executive director Li Hiaw Ho said: 'Based on the highest bid submitted, the break-even cost for the site is likely to be around $1,700 to $1,800 psf ppr.

'This would provide the successful bidder with a stabilised yield of around 4.5 per cent to 5 per cent based on a gross rent of about $9 to $10 psf each month.'

The site was launched for tender by the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) on July 4.

URA said that a decision on the award of the tender will be made once the bids have been evaluated. It will be announced later.

Firstoffice is owned by Homerun 28, which is based in Mauritius.

The Singapore firm's directors include Australian Andrew Heithersay, who lives in Hong Kong, Singapore permanent resident Ian Mackie and Singaporean Woo May Poh.