Sakae Holdings founder Douglas Foo selling bungalow for S$16.13m

https://www.businesstimes.com.sg/rea...low-for-s1613m

Sakae Holdings founder Douglas Foo selling bungalow for S$16.13m

Fashionista Pek Lay Peng picks up a property in Jalan Kampong Chantek for S$15.3m

NOV 06, 2018

KALPANA RASHIWALA


SAKAE Holdings executive chairman and founder Douglas Foo is understood to be selling a bungalow in Cassia Drive in District 11 for nearly S$16.13 million.

The price works out to S$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 recently after Sakae Holdings lost US$4.3 million selling sugar to a disappearing customer.

The sugar sale had been invoiced in December last year and remained unpaid for months before Deloitte, Sakae's auditor, 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 along Windsor Park Hill, at S$23.5 million or S$1,068 psf on the sprawling freehold site of about 22,000 sq ft. It is being bought by a member of the Wang family that controls JMD Investment. The Wangs are the paternal relatives of the family of Charles & Keith CEO Charles Wong, according to an earlier article.

Meanwhile, fashionista Pek Lay Peng, owner of multi-label omnichannel 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 S$15.3 million or S$1,372 psf on land area.

Standing on an elevated site of about 11,155 sq ft, the property was renovated a few years ago and is understood to have five ensuite bedrooms; the master bedroom has a big walk-in wardrobe and its own lounge/study area. The house also has an infinity pool. It is currently tenanted.

Along Bishopsgate in the Chatsworth Park GCB Area, a bungalow is transacting for nearly S$27.89 million or S$1,849 psf on land area of 15,085 sq ft. It had been jointly owned by Liu Cheng Chan, the founder of Parakou Shipping who died last year, and his wife Chik Sau Kam.

Spanning two levels, an attic and a basement, the house has seven ensuite bedrooms, a family entertainment room and a lap pool. The buyer is involved in a host of businesses including tea leaves, ship bunkering and passenger ferry services.

According to List Sotheby's International Realty's analysis of caveats captured by URA Realis, year to date, 35 deals totalling S$871.4 million have been sealed in GCB Areas.

For the whole of last year, there were 42 transactions amounting to S$888.6 million.

Market watchers note that in addition to the S$871 million in caveated deals since the start of this year, there have been at least S$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.

William Wong, founder of Realstar Premier, observed that since the second quarter of this year, demand for bungalows in GCB Areas has been very 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."