http://www.businesstimes.com.sg/arch...-site-20120927

Published September 27, 2012

Plans for mid-range condo on Dairy Farm Road site

Winning bid for 99-yr leasehold land is from First Shine and Meadows Bright

By Nisha Ramchandani


HAVING landed the tender for a 99-year leasehold private residential site on Dairy Farm Road, First Shine Properties and Meadows Bright Development are planning to develop a mid-range condominium of about 400 units.

First Shine Properties is wholly owned by Hock Lian Seng Holdings, while Meadows Bright Development is jointly owned by TA Corporation (45 per cent), King Wan Corporation (35 per cent) and Far East Distillers (20 per cent). Their winning bid for the land parcel is about $244.32 million.

Hock Lian Seng, TA Corp and King Wan are all mainboard-listed companies.

A 50:50 joint-venture company, Bukit Timah Green Development (BTG), has been incorporated with a paid-up capital of $1 million. Subject to approval from the Urban Redevelopment Authority, BTG will handle the development of the site.

Located in an established private residential area, the site has a land area of 188,863 sq ft, a plot ratio of 2.1 and a maximum gross floor area of 396,621.1 sq ft.

The site is about 600 metres from the future Hillview MRT Station on the Downtown Line.

Based on the maximum gross floor area, the purchase price works out to approximately $616 psf per plot ratio.

BT reported last week that the winning bid was about 10 per cent higher than the next highest bid of $560.49 psf ppr from UOL Group unit Secure Development.

"Leveraging on our combined knowledge and expertise, we will roll out a quality development that will be very appealing to the market," said the chief executive of TA Corp, Neo Tiam Boon.

TA Corp said that it will fund its share of the acquisition and development costs through internal resources and bank debt.

It also noted that if it is appointed the main contractor, TA Corp will be able to grow its construction order book, in addition to being part of a sizeable residential development project.

Chua Leong Hai, chief executive of Hock Lian Seng, said: "The proposed condominium development lays a significant milestone for Hock Lian Seng since we incorporated property development as one of our core businesses. It marks our first residential development, and our foray into large-scale high-quality condominium development."