Sakae Holdings founder selling bungalow for $16.13m
So far, 35 deals have been sealed in good class bungalow areas, compared to 42 transactions last year
Sakae Holdings executive chairman and founder Douglas Foo is understood to be selling a bungalow in Cassia Drive in District 11 for nearly $16.13 million.
The price works out to $1,542 per square foot based on the freehold land area of 10,458 sq ft. Located in the Raffles Park good class bungalow (GCB) area, the two-storey property is on a squarish plot.
Mr Foo has been in the news, after Sakae Holdings lost US$4.3 million (S$5.9 million) selling sugar to a customer who seemed to have disappeared. The sugar sale was invoiced last December and remained unpaid for months till Sakae's auditor Deloitte, flagged the issue to the board on Aug 27.
Mr Foo has a direct and deemed interest in 65.91 per cent of Sakae Holdings.
The Cassia Drive bungalow which Mr Foo and his wife are selling is an investment property; they live elsewhere.
Another recent transaction in a GCB area was a sprawling freehold site of about 22,000 sq ft at Windsor Park Hill, done at $23.5 million or $1,068 psf.
It was bought by a member of the Wang family that controls JMD Investment. The Wangs are the paternal relatives of the family of Charles & Keith chief executive officer Charles Wong.
Meanwhile, fashionista Pek Lay Peng, owner of multi-label omni-channel retailing platform SocietyA and executive director of the Shingda Group of Companies founded by her father Pek Ah Leck, has picked up a bungalow along Jalan Kampong Chantek, for $15.3 million or $1,372 psf on land area.
Standing on an elevated site of about 11,155 sq ft, the property is understood to have five en suite bedrooms; the master bedroom has a walk-in wardrobe and its own lounge/study area.
The house also has an infinity pool. It is currently tenanted.
According to List Sotheby's International Realty's analysis of caveats captured by URA Realis, year to date, 35 deals totalling $871.4 million have been sealed in GCB areas.
For the whole of last year, there were 42 transactions amounting to $888.6 million.
Market watchers note that in addition to the $871 million in caveated deals since the start of this year, there have been at least $215 million in transactions completed in the same period for which caveats were not lodged by buyers.
Bungalows in GCB Areas are the most prestigious form of landed housing in Singapore, with strict planning conditions stipulated to safeguard their exclusivity and low-rise character. There are only about 2,500 bungalows in the 39 GCB areas.
Mr William Wong, founder of Realstar Premier, observed that since the second quarter of this year, demand for bungalows in GCB areas has been selective.
"For those in prime locations such as Tanglin, Cluny and Dalvey, there is still a strong pool of demand from buyers prepared to pay a premium; it takes a shorter period of one to three months typically to move a property that comes on the market.
"In comparison, it could take six to nine months to find a buyer in locations further away." - THE STRAITS TIMES
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