The Sabah Housing and Real Estate Developers Association (SHAREDA) President, Datuk Sr Chua Soon Ping led a small delegation for a 3-day networking and study trip to Singapore recently from 20-22 Sept. 2022. SHAREDA made an inaugural courtesy call to the President – Mr Chia Ngiang Hong and his Management Committee of Real Estate Developers’ Association Singapore (REDAS) on 22nd September morning at their office.

Seated in the centre is Mr Chia Ngiang Hong, REDAS President and on his right is Datuk Sr Chua Soon Ping, SHAREDA President with delegates from SHAREDA and REDAS during the courtesy call on 22.09.2022.

Exchange of mementos between SHAREDA President, Datuk Sr Chua Soon Ping (left) with
REDAS President, Mr Chia Ngiang Hong (right).

Datuk Sr Chua said “REDAS, under their President Mr Chia Ngiang Hong of City Developments Ltd (CDL) and Singapore government collaborated in joint efforts to attract and retain foreign investors in Singapore despite encountering current challenges. Even though Singapore imposed 35% stamp duty on foreigners to buy properties, they still managed to collect SGD 4.68 billion from foreigners on the sale of properties.”

Singapore government being the largest land owners is monitoring the usage of land, as to plan ahead, they encourage to continue to build high-rise over landed properties.

The public flats under the Housing And Development Board (HDB) are being cautiously developed by the government to allocate for first home buyers to only Singaporeans. It will be a moratorium for at least five (5) years prior to sale to either permanent residents (PR) or citizens. After five (5) years, they normally upgraded and look for bigger and more luxurious units termed as “HDB EC” (executive condo). The EC are gated and guarded HDB condos. Subsequently, only after 10 years, then it can be opened for sale to the public.

In Singapore, the appreciation of properties continued to up-trend though the ROI is only staying at 2% - 3% only. Giving examples from one of the largest developers, CDL City Development Ltd, their market cap is SGD10 billion excluding overseas investments.

In the afternoon of the same day, SHAREDA made a courtesy call to Ar Melvin Tan, President of the Singapore Institute of Architects (SIA). The institute with more than 200 architect firms and 900 professionals’ strength to offer services to overseas, namely, GLCs such as Mabletree, CapitaLand, Keppel, etc, are looking for overseas potential developments. 

Ar Melvin Tan SIA President is standing at the left side of Datuk Sr Chua Soon Ping,
SHAREDA President together with SHAREDA delegates and SIA members held on
22.09.2022.

SHAREDA also explored the prospects in hospitality management with Banyan Tree Holdings Ltd, a Singaporean multinational brand that manages and develops beach resorts, hotels and spas or wellness amongst others. SHAREDA delegates were received by Ms Caroline Giraud, Assistant Manager (Business Development Dept). We learnt that most of the properties managed by Banyan Tree are located in Thailand and Bali.

(centre) Ms Caroline Giraud, Banyan Tree and on her right is Datuk Sr Chua Soon Ping,
President with delegates of SHAREDA.

Overall, the networking and study trip in Singapore has been very successful with lots of key takeaways to take home to improve and enhance the growth of housing and real estate property developments in Sabah.