Invest now with up to UK$200,000 savings on luxurious, new, prime London Apartments!
Invest now with up to UK$200,000 savings on luxurious, new, prime London Apartments!
SP Setia builds on winning formula
By THE STAR
CEO: Key to a project’s success is to give what customers want
PETALING JAYA: The annual International Real Estate Federation (FIABCI) Malaysia Property Award (MPA) has, over the years, highlighted some of the best developments the local property sector has to offer.
One project that stands out is SP Setia Bhd’s Setia Eco Gardens mixed “green” township in Johor, which won the MPA 2008 (Master Plan category) and FIABCI Prix d’Excellence Award 2009 (Best Master Plan Development) category.
President and chief executive officer Tan Sri Liew Kee Sin said the philosophy, or “masterplan” behind the success of the eco-themed development was to “give what customers want.”
“To be a leader in property development, you need to come up with something innovative. But to do that, you must first know what your customers want,” he told StarBiz.
Inspired by its Setia Eco Park development in Shah Alam, the 379.2ha freehold Setia Eco Gardens is located in the heart of Iskandar Malaysia.
With a gross development value of RM3.5bil, the project was being developed in phases and would take a decade to complete, said Liew. Up to September 2009, SP Setia had sold 362 of the 369 units launched, raking in sales totalling RM92mil.
Tan Sri Liew Kee Sin: ‘To be a leader in property development, you need to come up with something innovative.’Liew said 98% of the buyers were local and the remainder comprised Singaporeans. He added that the development was like “living in a modern world but with natural surroundings.”
“It’s a place where nature and man can co-exist side by side,” he said.
In preserving the environment, SP Setia set aside more than 14% of the land for green zones, double the 7% required for a standard mixed development.
The green zones comprise an 7.4ha Eco park, a 6.4ha rainforest, lush greenery, smaller landscaped parks as well as water features that include rivers, lakes and well-manicured canals.
All retention ponds were also converted into waterways and canals.
Energy conservation initiatives such as rainwater harvesting, water recycling system, water efficient fittings and photovoltaic solar panel are among the common features of the eco homes and eco villas.
Liew said the biggest challenge in developing an eco-based project was turning a barren piece of terrain into an ecological wonderland.
“Property development is about land and returns. It’s how to turn the land into a return on investment. It’s about having the right ecosystem for the project. We are blessed with a country that has a lot of rainfall and sunshine. Everything will grow.
“But the challenge is finding the right formula. Everybody can make char kuey teow but some do it better than others. That’s because they have the right ingredients,” he said.
Liew said that while it was always an honour to win awards, the business of property development was not about winning accolades.
“We don’t go about planning to win an award. We’re in business. We need to come up with something that can differentiate ourselves from other developers or what we think the customers will want to buy from us.
“But along the way if we win an award, we’re thankful but it’s not our major purpose,” he said.
Fiabci Malaysia will be organising the 2009 MPA on Nov 16 in Kuala Lumpur, with Malayan Banking Bhd as the official sponsor. The emphasis for this year’s award is Intrinsic Value in Holistic Living.
The categories that will be contested are: Property CEO of the Year, Master Plan, Residential Development (low rise and high rise), Retail Development, Office Development and Purpose-Built Project. The event will be graced by the Sultan of Selangor.
Read more...
Budget 2010: Seeing green
By THE STAR
BUDGET 2010, that was tabled on Oct 24, saw the Government taking concerted effort to encourage Malaysians to embrace green technology.
This is a move in tandem with growing concerns of not only Malaysians but the entire world in preserving our resources and the environment for the future. The drive to preserve the environment comes with monetary costs and certainly with government incentives to ease such cost from the individual will bring economic sense to environmental objectives.
To intensify green-awareness activity and to encourage the practice of environmentally-friendly lifestyle, the Government had allocated RM20mil. Among other efforts, is an international exhibition on green technology that will be organised in April 2010.
The Government will also give priority to environmental-friendly products and services that comply with green-technology standards in government procurement of goods and services.
A fund of RM1.5bil has been allocated for soft loans to companies that supply and use green technology. For suppliers, maximum financing is RM50mil per supplier and, for users, it’s RM10mil per company. The Government will bear 2% of the total interest rate in the said soft loan and will guarantee 60% of the amount financed.
Applications for this “green loan” are to be made to the National Green Technology Centre and the scheme will commence on Jan 1, 2010. It’s estimated that a total of 140 companies could benefit from the “green loan”.
Apart from such broad-based initiatives, the Government has come around to back the Green Building Index (GBI) by Persatuan Akitek Malaysia and the Association of Certified Engineers Malaysia in a two-tier strategy.
First, building owners or developers obtaining the GBI certification between Oct 24, 2009 and Dec 31, 2014 will be given income tax exemption equivalent to the additional capital expenditure in obtaining the certificate. It is known in the industry that greening the building can add up to 20% on top of the usual construction cost.
Such additional capital expenditure will then save the building owner in long-term operational expenditure as the cost of running the building will be cheaper. On the implementation of this tax exemption, developers and building owners will have a double benefit of not only saving long-term operational cost but also the upfront tax savings.
It will be difficult to quantify the actual additional expenditure as building owners/developers could overstate the additional expenditure in order to obtain higher-income tax exemption. To this cause, it would be appropriate for the architects or quantity surveyors of the project to cost out this additional amount and for the Green Building Index Accreditation Panel to determine and certify the actual additional capital expenditure.
Otherwise, it may also be prudent for the Government to fix the percentage of capital expenditure for the various GBI green ratings that is Platinum, Gold, Silver and Certified. For ease of operation, the latter may be a more feasible option.
The second tier in the strategy is for stamp duty exemption on the instrument of transfer of ownership for first purchasers of buildings with GBI certificate from developers between Oct 24, 2009 and Dec 31, 2014. The exemption amount is reported to be equivalent to the additional cost in obtaining the GBI certificate. How this operates is actually unclear.
The question asked: Is the additional cost in obtaining the certificate only or is the additional capital expenditure included?
Nevertheless, these two tiers, tax and stamp duty incentive to promote the development of green buildings will certainly push developers to seriously consider green building technology.
Developers and building owners will certainly decide to incorporate green features into their buildings to obtain the GBI certificate and take advantage of the tax incentives. Since the GBI certificate can be granted for both new construction and building upgrades, the move will also encourage owners of older buildings to upgrade their buildings to obtain GBI certification and thus claim tax exemption on such costs.
Green building certification is not only for office buildings but also available for condominiums, industrial buildings, hotels and even townships. The Government has announced that Putrajaya and Cyberjaya are to be developed as pioneer townships in green technology.
Therefore, even private developers could aim for GBI certification of their township and take advantage of the tax exemption on the additional cost to go green. The purchasers of their products will also stand to benefit from the stamp duty exemption. This will certainly give such development a competitive edge.
These incentives stop on Dec 31, 2014 but, to keep the green momentum going, longer-term policies would be necessary.
● Sarkunan Subramaniam is executive director of Knight Frank Malaysia. He was in charge of the exercise to act for a major oil & gas company in its search for a green building to consolidate its principal office operations that was recently concluded in KL Sentral.
Read more...
Qatar's Ezdan to sell partof portfolio to Malaysian REIT
By REUTERS
DOHA: Qatar's Ezdan Real Estate Co expects its net profit in the fourth quarter to be similar to that of the third and is aiming to sell part of its property portfolio by year-end to a Malaysian-basedREIT to finance new projects, its managing director said yesterday.
Qatar's largest property developer by market value expects strong demand for affordable housing in its home market.
The fourth quarter net profit result would be "similar" to the 94 million Qatar riyals made in the third quarter, Hesham el-Sahtary told Reuters in an interview.
Ezdan, with about US$1 billion (RM3.41 billion) worth of projects under construction, is also working on selling some of its portfolio, worth about 600-700 million riyals to a real estate investment trust based in Malaysia to help finance future projects.
"They will buy the property from us and we will manage it for them with a fixed return," said Sahtary. "The plan is to launch it in Malaysia as an international fund and we hope to conclude it this year," he said.
Punjab aims to emulate Malaysia's success in low-cost housing
By BUSINESS TIMES
ISLAMABAD: Malaysian expertise in low-cost housing for workers is expected to become the catalyst for the entry of more foreign direct investment in the booming industrial sector in Pakistan.
Punjab Industrial Estates Development and Management Company (PIE) chief executive officer Sabir P. Chohan said Malaysia's track record in the housing industry was expected to provide added benefit to efforts to woo FDI.
He said the government of Punjab was in the midst of negotiations with Malaysian housing giant, Renexus, on the proposed construction of 50,000 low-cost houses at industrial zones in Punjab.
The first area that could see Malaysian-built units could be the Sundar Industrial Estate, an hour out of Lahore.
"We have been in contact with Renexus and had hoped for a memorandum of understanding to be signed on November 26. But it has been postponed to a later date," he told a group of visiting Malaysian journalists.
Sabir said the chief minister of Punjab, Shahbaz Sharif, had issued specific instructions to PIE to emulate the Malaysian model in building housing for workers at industrial estates.
Sabir said two Malaysian companies - Bandaraya Development and Maxcorp Husnain Private Ltd - were already making a name for themselves in construction in Punjab, the largest of the four provinces with a population of 110 million.
Bandaraya Development has developed a top-class tourist project while Maxcorp was involved in redesigning, developing, financing and operating activities of the former Pakistan Railway Club.
On whether Punjab would follow the example of neighbouring Sindh province in creating an exclusive economic zone for Malaysian investors, he said the state provincial government had given the green light for the project.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
