Singapore’s residential en bloc sales market has recovered this year following a hiatus in 2009. So far, there are more than 30 successful collective sales amounting to $1.6 billion.
However, the size of each en bloc sale transacted this year was smaller compared to those in 2005 to 2007.
Majority of the en bloc sales of residential projects transacted in 2010 were below $50 million each, with the average value of every deal at around $52.6 million. By comparison, the average value of each en bloc sale during the height of the market boom in 2007 was $119.3 million.
In terms of the number of existing apartments and land area, the size of each en bloc sale transacted this year was also smaller. The average land area of the en bloc sales properties concluded this year is around 36,000 sq ft, overshadowed by the average 105,000 sq ft of land of the collective sales in 2007.
About 94 percent of the successful en bloc sale developments this year comprised of less than 50 existing units, and the average size is around 22 existing units in each project.
By comparison, the average number of existing units of the successful en bloc sale developments in 2007 is around 3.5 times larger.
The prime residential areas also saw fewer en bloc sales this year. Only around one-fifth of the successful collective sale developments this year were situated in the prime Districts 9, 10 and 11. The total transacted value of these collective projects in the prime districts amounted to $678 million.
Many of the en bloc sales projects were located in the city-fringe areas like Districts 12 and 14. In 2007, about half of the 104 successful en bloc sales were in the prime districts.
Collective sales properties in the prime districts had a combined transacted value of about $8.5 billion.
The fewer and smaller en bloc sales this year was due to the fact that many of the larger developments in the popular East Coast region and prime districts that could possibly be en bloc sales projects were already snapped up by developers in 2005 to 2007.
Another reason is that the development sites from the GLS programme for this year, particularly for the second half, had drawn the attention and resources of many property developers.