Singapore’s unique ‘collective sales’ lose appeal to investors even as housing market shows signs of early recovery
- Unique to Singapore, a collective sale is a sale of property that is under multiple ownership to a single buyer, who usually intends to redevelop the site
- Collective sales had been slowing since 2018, but last year’s residential collective sales worth about S$200 million dwarfed this year’s as the coronavirus crisis hit demand
So far this year, there has been only one residential “collective sale” in Singapore. Yuen Sing Mansion in Geylang was sold in August for S$15.2 million (US$11.2 million) to a company owned by a Singaporean citizen and a Chinese national.
Unique to Singapore, a collective sale is a sale of properties that are under multiple ownership to a single buyer, who usually intends to redevelop the site.
The duo behind that purchase also bought Casa Sophia on Sophia Road last year, according to a register of sales with Singapore authorities. Their company is identified by property portal EdgeProp as East Asia Sophia Development.
The Singapore-based real estate developer is owned by Zhang Zhiming, whose wife, Huang Yanhong, is now a Singaporean citizen, and also a director of the company. Huang’s elder brother, Huang Guangyu, “was once China’s richest man and founder of Hong Kong-listed Gome Electrical Appliances, one of the biggest consumer electrical appliances retailers in China,” according to EdgeProp.
“The collective sales market has been quiet since the cooling measures in July 2018,” said Tricia Song, head of research for Singapore at property consultancy Colliers.
Those measures included a hike in the levy on foreigners buying property to 20 per cent from 15 per cent previously.