How do you decide which Real Estate Company to Join?

Many new Property Agents especially before taking their exams are wondering what are the best prerequisites of which property agencies to join after clearing their RES papers. Here’s a few of what is important in my take on which ones to go for after consulting a couple of friends running the Real Estate agency business.

Branding

A way to identify whether a particular Real Estate Agency has its brand close to everyone’s heart would be how much a reach an Agency has over its audience. They typically would command a decent number of realtors in terms of market size for this to happen. It also holds true that the longer a brand is in the market, the reach is more mature.

Only practicing Realtors would be able to identify and see the growth of different Agencies since they are in touch with the market, else new Realtors would have to seek help from practicing friends on their feedback.

Some do have their different strength in different segments on the market. Niche franchise brands where numbers are smaller might have a certain reputation for being in segments such as private, commercial or even luxury residential. If you are looking for a certain niche to start with, you could start by exploring on the reputation of the agency as with how much you can leverage.

Generally you would hear of groups or divisions of Realtors carving their own branding, which are much more prominent and active in the market as well. Their choice would usually be a brand that sticks and is more prevalent, as they would rather much concentrate on their sales instead of worrying about the Agency they are in.

Continue reading “How do you decide which Real Estate Company to Join?”

New Master Plan 2014 is Gazetted

After a long time wait, the Chief Planner has finally gazetted the new plans which will determine the land laws for the next 5 years.

Published Date: 06 Jun 2014

The Chief Planner has gazetted the Master Plan 2014 on 6 June 2014. The Master Plan 2014 is the statutory land use plan that guides the physical development of Singapore for the medium term.

As part of the Master Plan, all 75 heritage buildings proposed for conservation under the Draft Master Plan 2013 were also gazetted today. See Annex A for the list of buildings.

The gazetting of the Master Plan concludes the year-long review of the Draft Master Plan 2013, which was exhibited in November 2013 for a month at The URA Centre Atrium and URA website. During this period, the exhibition attracted some 61,000 visitors, and the website had more than 513,000 page views. The review also involved consultations with Members of Parliament, grassroots leaders, professional institutions and other stakeholders. We thank members of the public for their positive and constructive feedback.

Read the full release here. To view the gazetted Master Plan 2014, you can browse it here.

Ritz at Farrer Attractive Guaranteed Rental Returns

It’s something too good not to miss. Seriously!

Ritz at Farrer is offering 5% guaranteed rental returns to your purchase of selected apartments for not one, but two years. Sitting in a great freehold location, this mixed development is already a great project to begin with. And this offer is only for a limited time.

Ritz at Farrer Night View (artiste impression)
Ritz at Farrer Night View (artiste impression)

Ritz at Farrer Project Information

Address – 142 Race Course Road
Tenure – Freehold
Development Type – 18 Apartments with 2 Commercial Units on Ground Floor
Developer – One42 Development
ArchitectRonny Chin Architects (RCA)
Unit Types – 1+1-bedroom, 2-bedrooms, 2+1-bedrooms, 3-bedrooms, 3+1-bedrooms, 2 shops
Ready by – 2016 Q2
Facilities – 2 Rooftop Outdoor Pool, BBQ, Outdoor Gym, Cascading Waterfall features Continue reading “Ritz at Farrer Attractive Guaranteed Rental Returns”

Goodwood Residence has TOP

Goodwood Residence by Guocoland has just received its Temporary Occupation Permit (TOP) status a week back. Situating at the beginning of Bukit Timah Road, this freehold development is conveniently located right next to Balmoral Plaza. Within reach of many international and prime schools, the location is a boon to familes who have kids studying around the vicinity and has business in the CBD area.

Quick Project Information about Goodwood Residence

Project NameGoodwood Residence
Developer – Guocoland
Architect – WOHA Architects
Address – 261, 263 & 265 Bukit Timah Road (D10)
Tenure – Freehold (Estate in Fee Simple)
Type – Condominium development with two blocks of 12-storey residential flats
Number of Apartments -210
Carparks – 394
Facilities – Full Facilities including 2 Tennis Courts

Photos of Facilities

Lush landscaping was done, facilities were very well thought. The club-house and concierge service provided is a luxury for residents. Each resident also have a golf club locker provided at the basement lobby which is well designed to receive guest too. Continue reading “Goodwood Residence has TOP”

Difference between Cloud Storages & Evernote

A Happy New Year to everyone :-)

SRI5000 SLP Realty, Benson Koh training on Evernote 101 - The Basics.
SRI5000 SLP Realty, Benson Koh training on Evernote 101 – The Basics.

After a training for my agency SLP Realty earlier in the morning and I think these snippets are pretty useful to share as they are common questions to which Dropbox, Google Drive users would normally ask in terms of how they manage their cases and productivity. There are also several other pointers which I brought out which is important in order for Evernote to be useful to you.

Evernote vs Dropbox, Sugarsync, Google Drive, SkyDrive (Whatever you can think of)

Dropbox, Sugarsync, Google Drive, Sky Drive are cloud services which offers online backups. Although they are useful and many swears by organizing their database cleanly so that it becomes effective, it was never meant to be a planning tool. Continue reading “Difference between Cloud Storages & Evernote”

A Friend’s Take on Singapore Property Cooling Measures

I thought this is too true and unforgivable if I don’t share this. This is an opinion by a good friend who prefers to be anonymous. And like how he ends it, you do your numbers.

Good Morning,

If you have the time, here’s something to think about over the weekend. This was first written in 2010. I have updated some details and numbers. Nevertheless, the principles are still relevant. Here’s my take on the these measures.

These new measure are targeted at the Speculators & Speculative Investors (“Specuinvestor”) i.e. those who are in the game for the short term, generally not very financially savvy and most of all, not very cash-rich but wants to make a quick buck. What happens is that they tend to over-leverage and have a “punting’ mentality. It will not really affect those with deeper pockets. Another 10% to 20% cash downpayment……… so what? These people will be thinking “Hey, it is just like paying down my loan resulting in lower monthly payments, lower interest payments and higher principle payments ………….…….. no skin off my nose”. Continue reading “A Friend’s Take on Singapore Property Cooling Measures”

Redhill GLS – Litmus Test to Singapore Market

The Singapore Government has cut short of supply to their Government Land Sales with the announcement of 7 new sites for next year in H1 2014. Of the 7, 4,630 private apartments can be carved to the supply and it’s one of the lowest supply introduced since 2010.

Right next to Wingtai’s “The Crest” (960 psfppr in September 13) would be the only GLS plot (2.37ha) which is at City fringe for H1 2014 and can potentially yield 655 homes would be the highlight of the exercise.

This would be a good indicator of Singapore developers sentiments for the market on whether are they still positive on topping and developing their land bank for the consumers.

With limited residential supplies coming online, the Government is watching very closely on the supplies as well to prepare a soft landing should the market do some corrections.

this is an interesting plot

ps. What’s interesting to me would be the commercial plot which is right next to City Plaza. The area has a good vibe going on with UOL’s Katong Regency coming online.

Cooling Measure for Executive Condominiums

To complete the loop for a sustainable Executive Condominium (ECs) market, Ministry of National Development has introduced 3 primary measures to the EC segment, primarily:-

  • Reduce EC Cancellation Fees – From existing 20% down to 5%
  • Resale Levy for Second-Timer Applicants – Formerly second timers are not required to pay a levy. This is applicable to only new EC land sales which are launched on or after 9th December 2013
  • Revision of Mortgage Loan Terms – From a previous mortgage servicing ratio (MSR) level of 60% to now 30% of a borrower’s gross monthly income. The MSR cap will apply to EC purchases from today onwards.

You can read more from the official source.

How will it affect the EC Market?

This will still primarily drive the 1st timers to purchase at ease and since they have lower cancellation fee, this would allow them to think prudently on their financing capability. Backing out would be less painful for them.

2nd timers would probably rush for existing EC launches prior before today so they would be able to avoid the levy. Again, these pool of purchasers would weed out in the market gradually.

EC developers would also be more careful when it comes to bidding for future EC land when it comes to affordability of EC purchasers since the MSR level came down drastically. We’ll see more competitive land bids for future plots; if not lesser.

Will it affect the Overall Market?

As of current, the primary indicator would still be HDB. With HDB prices tapering and aggressive supplies in the pipeline introduced by the government coming online, this would be the median basis of the fundamentals.

Prices should soften for the resale market for the next two quarters, as we’re experiencing a shift of tide already from the seller to the buyer’s market.

Whilst prices might soften, residential buyers should not expect a drastic drop in pricing as the rental market for residential segment is still active.

Riots at Little India Resolved, Roads are Open

Little India Riot - credits to TodayOnline

Riots happened in Little India last night around 9.30pm at the cross junction of Race Course Road and Hampshire Road involving at least 400 people, involving some 300 police both Special Operations Command (SOC) and the Gurkhas Contingent were activated to mobilise the incident. You can read more about it in Straits Times Online.

Personal Thoughts

As of most Singaporeans, I had trouble sleeping knowing there was mishap happening in the country. The speed of social media’s reach was amazing. Twitter triumph all social platforms on the updates, even faster than our news media since the first photo of the riot was posted, and videos follow suit in Youtube for the explosions of the emergency vehicles. A hashtag search on #littleindiariot and you would get the latest updates with Minister Tan Chuan-Jin (@chuanjin1) pleading the public to stay calm during the ordeal. The tag has caught a huge global audience with the trending ranks of Twitter.

Kudos to the effective Home Team whom managed to subdue the angry mob within a short period of time without even firing a shot (Having gone through Army, I understand the rules of engagement well). At least no one else apart from the traffic accident was killed amidst the riot. My heartfelt gratitude to the peacekeeping HomeTeam and people whom are trying to help on site even amidst the chaos. Continue reading “Riots at Little India Resolved, Roads are Open”