PropertyGuru Wins CNBC International Property Award

Congratulations to PropertyGuru for winning an international Property Award from CNBC ;)

PropertyGuru.com.sg Scoops Prestigious CNBC International Property Award

The results of the CNBC Asia Pacific Property Awards 2008 have just been revealed and AllProperty Media’s www.PropertyGuru.com.sg website has won an award in the category of “Best Property Portal Singapore”. The award will be presented at a glittering gala dinner to be held at the Marina Mandarin in Singapore on 20th July 2008.

Now in its 13th year, the International Property Awards are the largest real estate event recognizing the industry’s leading property professionals from around the globe. Hundreds of residential property-related firms from over 56 countries in Asia, Europe and Americas were evaluated by a senior expert real estate panel as part of CNBC’s annual International Property Awards process. In the case of the “Property Portal” category, firms were assessed against key criteria including Strategy and Website Design, Structure and Operation, Online Presence and Innovative Features, Breadth and Depth of Property Services, and Strength of Online Marketing.

“We have worked hard to build PropertyGuru.com.sg into Singapore’s leading property portal and are delighted to be recognized by our industry peers. It will spur us on to continue to innovate and provide even better service to Singapore’s consumers, real estate developers and agents.” said Jani Rautiainen and Steve Melhuish, co-founders of AllProperty Media and PropertyGuru.com.sg.

Having been given this high recommendation, PropertyGuru.com.sg is now entitled to display the CNBC Asia Pacific Property Awards’ logo with pride. This symbol of excellence will be recognised and appreciated by the public who are increasingly well informed and discerning about the properties they seek to buy.

Entries were judged by a panel of professionals whose collective knowledge of the property industry is second to none. Chaired by Eric Pickles, British Shadow Secretary of State, this year’s judges included Helen Shield, editor-in-chief of International Homes magazine; Peter Bolton King, chief executive of the National Association of Estate Agents; Phil Spencer, property expert and presenter of Channel 4’s Location and Relocation TV shows; Imtiaz Farookhi, chief executive of the National House Building Council; Christopher Hall, past president National Association of Estate Agents; Wilhelm Harnish, Master Builders of Australia (MBA); Thijis Staff, International Consortium of Real Estate Agents Association (ICREA); Santiago Herreros de Tejada, SIMA; Kirkor Ajderhanyan, French Real Estate Federation (FNAIM); Graham Norwood of the Daily Mail; David Hoppit, property writer; Paul Wyatt, head of design for LYCOS UK; Geoff Cohen, design director at Aukett Fitzroy Robinson architects; Jill Keene, editor of International Homes magazine; Diana Yakely, chairman British Interior Design Association; and Tad Zurlinden, Association of Relocation Professionals.

The award will be officially presented at a glittering gala dinner in Singapore on 20th July 2008 at the Marina Mandarin, attended by senior representatives from the international real estate industry.

About CNBC International Property Awards:

The annual International Property Awards recognizes the industry’s best residential property professionals from around the globe. Now in its 13th year, the awards have seen steady growth and the support team has grown from just two people to a team of 12 over the period and with entries from across the globe with firms representing 56 different countries. The awards are now established as the biggest in the world.

Winners from each country are re-judged and up to five are nominated within each category for the chance of being chosen as the Best in the World. In 2007 we held the grand final gala event at the internationally famous Bellagio Hotel in Las Vegas. Winning companies were also showcased at the world’s largest real estate professionals event organised by two of our sponsors – NAR and SIMA. 30,000 property professionals attended this in November 2007. In 2008 Gala events are planned for Singapore, Dubai, Madrid, London and New York.

The annual International Property Awards are judged by a panel of well-respected experts representing well-established professional bodies from different countries.

Now that’s another good way to bang your bucks for advertising if you’re a fellow Realtor.

Reliable Internet Mobile Connection for Singapore Realtors – M1 Broadband, Singtel Broadband on Mobile or Starhub Maxmobile?

To fellow Realtors, have you met up with a situation where you’d really like to check on caveat prices or get a document from your Agency’s website really badly and have to travel all the way back to the office or home to get things done when you can close your deal in an instance if you have a laptop and a working internet connection in hand?

Let me paint the picture “Oh crap, I have to logon to e-Office to check on the recent transacted price. . Sigh wish I can logon to AgenTools now to arrange for viewings for my client in my car” I bet they’re familiar.

Sure you could just go to any Starbucks or Macdonalds or even anywhere near central to get a WIFI connection provided by Wireless@SG, but that means you have to travel to the particular place and it doesn’t mean that your connection would still be reliable. I had this problem in Starbucks recently even when Wireless@SG has two access points, connection is totally intermittent.

INTRODUCING YOUR UNLIMITED MOBILE CONNECTION FRIENDS (IN SINGAPORE ONLY OF COURSE)

Try using the solutions in other countries and pay for roaming charges, be warned. I have been a subscriber of these 3G sim card solutions ever since a year ago when M1 just introduced a flat fee plan for an unlimited plan (data cap, but anything more than 1 GB is more than enough if you don’t download stuffs with it).

M1 – M1 Broadband. It’s Anywhere

Cost (at the moment) – $22.42 per month for 1MBPS, no Data Cap, 6 months contract

What you get when you sign up: A Vodafone USB Modem or a Vodafone PCMCIA Modem or a Linksys Vodafone 3G/UTMS Router

Singtel – Singtel Broadband on Mobile

Cost (at the moment) – $22.42 per month for 512KBPS, 50G Cap, 12 – 24 months contract

ps. I’ve signed up for 24 months contract, 12 months free subscription, which effectively cuts my subscription fee to $11.21 per month

What you get when you sign up: a Huawei USB Modem or a Samsung USB Modem (with free 1GB space). I opted for the Samsung one

Starhub – MaxMobile

Cost (at the moment) – $72.76 (50% off for Starhub customers) per month for 7.2MBPS

ps. Apparently the most expensive one in town if you are not an existing Starhub customer to enjoy the 50% off (even with the 50% thrown in), but of course, good speed.

With these solutions, you can always use your laptop on the go in any parts of Singapore and have your work done. If you think carrying your laptop is a hassle, a dual sim card PDA phone could use your plan too. Just simply put this particular 3G sim card to the DATA slot of your dualsim phone to enjoy a reliable connection.

MY VOTE GOES TO…

Photo credit: dpcafe

Singtel’s Broadband on Mobile. Probably because its basestations have better coverage in Singapore than the two other Telecommunication provider. I was even trying this connection on my friend’s cabin cruiser in Serimbun on the sea trying to email my client. Connection is smooth and flawless for even a 512KBPS connection.

M1 was ok, but the connection was somewhat weak/ and sometimes no connection at some parts of Singapore, namely the West area and especially Sentosa.

No chance to try Starhub’s. Too hefty for a non-Starhub customer to carry IMO. But I don’t really need a 7.2MBPS solution for my job. No multimedia intensive presentation required.

It seems that Singtel and M1 are having a price war on their mobile internet solutions. You can take the advantage now to sign up for any of their plans now, whoever is giving a better offer.

ps. Singtel’s naming convention of their mobile internet service would score much better in SEO on the internet. Smart.

Knight Frank Singapore Business Conference – We Are Real

The conference in Fullerton Hotel was pleasant. Not a hit, but real pleasant.

Most of our Knight Frank Realtors were present, good colleagues Jimmy, Meng and Sean too. It’s a good gathering session which started off with a motivational talk from Nanz Chong, the founder of One.99 shop that went bust in 2003.

She was okay. At least she had an edge with failures that made her stronger, which I think her words actually made sense. I’ve heard better motivational speakers but hers was relevant and concise enough.

The best speaker of the day was Dr Billy Kueek, a real motivational speaker who knows how to catch your attention. Pointers were derived from experience and he made his studies before coming to give a presentation. He deserves the thumbs up of the day even ask compared to Dr Tan Tee Koon, runner-up. It’s always a knack when your presenters actually don’t make use of any paper references when they’re talking about their stuffs.

They know what they’re talking about. At least they come prepared.

Tony unleashed the new potential web 2.0 stuffs that he has made out for all Knight Frank agents. In all honesty, at this virgin stage, we wouldn’t exactly know how Google Adwords targeting niche words, buying multiple domains and engaging Mondarlezo for listing would help much. I’m seeing it from a point as an ex-Internet marketeer when I have experience some form of success in recognition and internet traffic rankings. The effort where I can see is placed mostly would be placing all the new and existing projects, this would definitely be a tough nut to crack.

It takes more than that to bring your site up to be a leading Realtor tool. Sorry for the flaming, but I don’t see the point of blogging your products. A particular agent mentioned about blogging her listings in her blogs, but again, it shouldn’t work this way.

I’ve seen Fred Teo’s Serangoon Garden blog, blogging about the area, the history and the culture. That’s a good line we can start off with. With additional help from REAL/ SEAL web, adding a huge big link on the blog portal to his listings would be probably the correct way since it’s aesthetically clean and should attract different kinds of guests when he’s blogging about the area which he has a niche in.

A site can only be successful with its usefulness relevancy, a huge multiple relevant backlinks, and optimized for SEO. Knight Frank is edging its way towards it.

I’ll be transforming this little space as soon as I can in the next few days to what I think a Realtor’s site should look like with Realweb so I don’t have to engage my programmer to custom the site dynamically for property listing.

It wasn’t a bad seminar experience indeed.

January 2008 CEHA Papers for Download

I’ve taken the liberty to scan all the January 2008 CEHA papers for fellow Realtors to download for reference.

Try not to take reference from what I’ve scribbled as they probably won’t be accurate.

I’ve lent all my notes and books to Joanne from Global. Perhaps anyone who needs them can contact me for to link up.

Cheers and good luck for the April paper. I’ll blog about what to prepare for materials and the settings so on and so forth on the next few entries.

A Helping Hand to 2008 July CEHA Intake

I’ve received a surprise call on my mobile from Emily, a fellow Realtor from DTZ asking for notes I have as she’s taking this upcoming intake CEHA course and has self enrolled for the papers instead of taking any courses from available CEHA courses on the market.

I suppose you can do so if you’re an experience agent who keeps yourself updated almost all time and are familiar with government policies, HDB especially; and calculations herein and out.

Over this weekend, I’m going to scan all 3 papers to share with every agents here; and whatever I could. If you’re interested in the notes, you can actually email me at benson@chocomedia.com to request the stuffs that I have prepared for Emily.

Now good luck to your CEHA accredition and break me the good news if you’ve gotten yourself cert-in!

ps. Even though most experienced agents will find sitting for the papers bothersome, try going for it. You’ll be amused by some tiny little details you don’t really know. Really.

Calculating Stamp Duty for Sale of Property in Singapore

So you’re about to purchase a property in Singapore, you’ve probably heard about Stamp Duty, a tax which the Inland Revenue of Singapore (IRAS) collects upon a new sale or tenancy of a real estate.

Stamp duty is a tax on documents relating to properties or shares.

How do you actually calculate your stamp duty for sale of property? Let’s find out.

Stamp Duty for Sale of Property

I’m referring to the IRAS website on Stamp Duty and you’re suppose to pay this tax if:

You have purchased a HDB Flat
You have purchased a completed property issued with Temporary Occupation Permit
You have purchased a property under construction
You have purchased a property by way of a sub-sale
You have acquired properties an enbloc purchase

The Formula

For Realtors, we simply use the formula of (Sale Price multiply by 3%) minus $5,400.0 for a quick guide, but if the price of the property falls below $360,000, this would be inaccurate. Remember we also have to round up to the nearest hundred dollar before calculating.

Example

Peter bought a walk up apartment at the price of $500,000.00, his stamp duty fees will be [($500,000 x 3%) – $5400] = $9,600

The real formula would be,

1% of the first $180,000, 2% of the next $180,000 and 3% of the remaining amount balance.

Let’s use the same formula for the above mentioned property Peter bought.

[3% of ( $500,000 – $180,000 – $180,000)] + (2% of $180,000) + 1% of ($180,000) = ( 3% of remaining $140,000 ) + (2% of 180,000) + (1% of 180,000) = $4,200 + $3,600 + $1,800 = $9,600

Who To Pay?

Most of the time, the purchaser will be responsible for paying the stamp duty fees unless otherwise stated on the Sales & Purchase or Option to Purchase terms and conditions.

The persons liable to pay stamp duty will be in accordance to the terms of the document. If the terms of the document are silent on this, under the Stamp Duties Act (Cap 312), the transferee or grantee has to pay stamp duty.

When To Pay?

Please take note that upon execution of Sales and Purchase agreement in most cases, you’ll have to get your documents stamped within 14 days or within 30 days if you are overseas. Late stamping would be subjected to penalties for violating the Stamp Duties Act (Cap. 312)

Penalties will be imposed on documents that are stamped late or for which stamp duty is underpaid.

If the delay does not exceed 3 months, the penalty is $10 or equal to the amount of the deficient duty, whichever is higher.

If the delay exceeds 3 months, the penalty is $25 or 4 times the amount of deficient duty, whichever is the higher.

Now that’s pretty hefty, so please make sure your Realtor gets this properly done up upon a sale of your new home or property!

SISV CEHA Course – April 2008 Intake

And I do believe in returning the favor whenever you receive something.

SISV is having it’s next course running for Common Examinations for Housing Agents (CEHA) in April for the July 2008 Examinations (7th, 8th and 9th July). If you’re a full time Realtor (Property Agent), you’ll have to rush and get your papers before the 2009 axe.

The objective of this SAEA Pre-CEHA course is to train estate agents to undertake agency work in Singapore. In particular, it is designed to prepare practising agents to take the CEHA examination. A pass in the CEHA is now a pre-requisite for those wishing to apply for a House Agent’s Licence under the Appraisers & House Agents Act. Under the SAEA’s requirement, all agents under the accredited agency must possess a pass in CEHA and be accredited by 1 January 2009.

Unfortunately, my agency is accredited.

The Files

The venue for all lessons from SISV are conducted in Toa Payoh Community Centre on Tuesdays and Thursdays (from 2 to 5pm for this season). Cost is SG$365 nett for all 3 papers.

Honest Review

I like the lecturers, they’re knowledgeable on their subjects, professionals to the real estate market scene. I actually like Sam Gian’s 10-year series, though some of the information have to be reviewed because of changing policies. He’s a funny man.

If you’re worried that you can’t pass your papers, I suggest enrolling with SISV and attend all the classes, it should put you in good shape before attending your papers.

The Singapore Property Search – Review, PropertyGuru

We continue our Singapore Property Search shootout on the next website, PropertyGuru.

Ease of Listing

Registration process is okay. It would be better if there’s a registration tab on top just for agents, especially the logging in for their “AgentNet“. Bookmarking it would seem to be the only easiest way to access the listing area since I can’t find the link to it on the index.

The AgentNet index is fancy. You can promote yourself by answering questions. I think Howard Teo (Dennis Wee) is doing pretty well as compared to the rest of the Singapore Realtors in this segment. Agents who’re knowledgeable can score well with queries coming from the public and leaving their contact behind so that they can clinch some new leads.

Are you a Property Guru? ;)

Options to list a property are comprehensive, but you can’t seem to expire a listing. Also, some properties do have more than 3 bathrooms, I suppose they’ve added the + sign after people had feedback on it, but it would be nicer to add bathroom numbers to “4” or “5”. It would be nice if people can add more than 3 photos to showcase.

Searching for a Property

Uh Uh. I’d be bashed, but it isn’t user friendly to me. I’d rather much prefer Myoochi‘s way of searching, at least with street or for a development. To each its own, but I wouldn’t be stereotyped or bogged by budget, the area, or the exact maximum price for rental or sale. To improve, maybe they would like to list down the areas in the districts rather than the district numbers (North/ West).

Plus Points of Listing

This is how it looks when you list it with PropertyGuru

+ Very clean listing, development details are listed as well (good for condominium listings, with the developer name and TOP date)
+ Allows potential clients to submit a form to contact you, with their email/ contact and their preference of contact.
+ Location map with amenities are listed by the sidebar. Great for potential buyers who’re interested in the particular development

Minus Points

– 3 photos limit isn’t good
– Premium listing are REALLY focused than normal listings. I understand when you pay you’ll get better features, but I suppose it shouldn’t be made so obvious. All the premium listing gets in front. My Sanctuary Green listing gets hidden in the pile of premiums without photos.
– Adding a video tour option would be good (though impractical at the moment)

Traffic/ Viewership

It’s doing better than Myoochi. One reason I can think of is it’s advertisements on the television. But is it the number one Property Search portal in Singapore as claimed by someone who actually gave me a call to register for the premium member (from PropertyGuru’s office) yet? Let’s see. *Compares.

True to some extend (those that I’m more familiar with), but very close fight with one which I will be reviewing soon. With such page views, you’ll get 200 – 300 unique visitors daily. From what I can see on the charts, their traffic is improving as well.

To hit expatriates or overseas market, I think SingaporeExpats is doing fantastic as compared to the search portals that I’ve seen. (In fact, the best).

Extra Features

The estate market data seems interesting. Also, the online valuation function is pretty accurate to how much a particular project cost now. Information about the different condominium projects and photos are here.

The site is tastefully done, but I’d say if it could improve on not focusing too much on Realtors that pay for their premium listing, it would fair better. (Not that I don’t want to pay to list, but with that kind of uniques in terms of traffic, it’s not worth my $50 per month just yet). Register here as an Agent to advertise your listing.

Rating: 2.5 /5.0 (Better viewer ship, but not worth the money to spend for membership for now)

Next…

iProperty will be next in the shootout.

Google’s Way of Countering MSN/ Yahoo Search

Just tried to install the new version of MSN Live Messenger and accidentally clicked on most of the default options to have MSN Search set as default when I was pleasantly surprised with some Google dialogue box coming out from nowhere.

Well, since I’m not so much of a Microsoft fan in terms of search, it saved me the time to switch Google back to default, but don’t you ever wonder why programs gets bigger in size in terms of megabytes when you install them with new upgrades?

Privacy will be the next big issue in the future as with our most common used programs studying our online habits. Pfft. Not that I’m not happy with Google axing MSN search in this way. It’s another whole big issue with ‘Legal Spyware’.