Coveted property ‘Oscar Award’
FOR a quarter of a decade, the Malaysia Property AwardTM organised by FIABCI Malaysia has been serving as a stage for local developers to showcase their innovative developments.
Dubbed the property ‘Oscar Award’, it is the aspiration of every real estate player to win this coveted accolade that recognises projects which best embody excellence in all disciplines involved in their creation.
This year’s award ceremony was held at the One World Hotel in Selangor last night.
The project winners will go on to represent Malaysia at the 2019 FIABCI World Prix d’Excellence Awards in Moscow, Russia, next May.
FIABCI Malaysia president Michael Geh said the Award is also a benchmark and driving force for developers to continue building more creative and innovative projects that will bring positive impact to the community and industry as a whole.
“The stringent four-tier assessment process begins annually with the organising committee studying the nominated projects for the preliminary eligibility confirmation.
“Any query will be communicated to the participating companies for answers or corrections.
“Non-compliance submissions are either rejected or reserved for the following year.”
He said qualified nominations are forwarded for physical site visits and verification by the team of evaluators who are divided into groups of four to six, each led by a group leader.
Each group works independently evaluating their assigned projects.
The evaluators are made up of those holding senior management positions in the real estate industry or relevant companies.
Although evaluators contribute voluntarily, their conduct is bound by a written code of ethnics to ensure that the entire process is conducted in an absolutely fair, professional, transparent and equitable manner.
“We are very strict right from the nomination stage considering the Award is the gold standard of the industry,” he said.
“The projects would then be judged by a Panel of Jury members, who are heads of national real estate associations and international real estate experts.”
At this point, only short-listed projects will proceed to the final judging stage, which is the Independent Judges meeting.
The Independent Judges are formed by respected members of society, with each being highly experienced in their own field, and not related to FIABCI in any manner.
“All national committee members of FIABCI Malaysia including its president cannot be appointed as the Independent Judges,” he explained.
The entire stringent judging process will take seven to eight months to complete.
The judging criteria is getting stricter by the years to ensure that the winners truly deserve the recognition.
The process starts with the call for entry, pre-qualification configuration, site visit by the evaluators, evaluators presentation, Panel of Jury meeting, Independent Judges meeting and finally, the announcement of the results.
Geh said the evaluators, Panel of Jury members and Independent Judges work voluntarily and independently.
They are requested to abstain from evaluating and judging the entire category if they have conflict of interest in any of the projects in that category.
“Only projects that score 75% marks and above will be qualified to win the award.
“If there is no project with such a score, there will be no winner for that particular category,” he further elaborated.
He added that FIABCI Malaysia is in constant effort to uphold the standard of the award by constantly reviewing the Award criteria based on feedback and ensuring that pre-qualification of submitted projects are strictly adhered to.
“All meetings and project physical site visits are closely monitored by the organising committee to ensure that procedures are followed and executed accordingly.
“New award categories are also being reviewed and added.
“The Affordable Housing Category was included in 2017 to encourage more developers to build quality affordable homes for the benefit of society.”
There are currently 19 categories, including two individual awards of Property Man and Property CEO.
The others are Affordable Housing, Environmental (Rehabilitation/Conservation), Heritage (Restoration/ Conservation), Hotel, Industrial, Master Plan, Office, Purpose-Built, Residential (Low-Rise), Residential (Mid-Rise), Residential (High-Rise), Resort, Retail, Special Award for National Contribution, and Sustainable Development.
The Malaysia Property AwardTM has indeed yielded an impregnable reputation in the industry.
Every succeeding year would see the quality and excellence of the country’s real estate industry advancing to international standard.
Independent Judges
Datuk Yeo Heng Hao Former Deputy Secretary General of Ministry of Housing & Local Government
Uniqueness is what I’m looking for when judging a project. If I think the project deserves 75 marks, it will get 75 marks and vice versa.
Datuk Donald Lim Siang Chai Former Deputy Finance Minister
I think that FIABCI has done a good job for the industry but for smaller developers to participate, a new category should probably be created for them.
Datuk Dr Junaidah Lee Abdullah
Former Deputy Secretary General of Ministry of Tourism
The Malaysia Property AwardTM has provided a good learning platform and competition stage for not only the developers but the architects as well. They get to compare their projects with others while at the same time learn from the winners and see what they are lacking in their own creations.
Panel of Jury
Sarly Adre Sarkum
Past President, Malaysia Green Building Confederation (MGBC)
The Malaysia Property AwardTM
serves as a benchmark for the quality of property developments, especially with regards to higher end projects.
Peter Koh
Founder, Gateway Property Consultants Pte Ltd (Singapore)
Honestly, I’m very impressed with the Award. It is very stringent and highly competitive. Somehow along the way, it will enhance the standard of the submitted projects. Hence, I would like to encourage developers who have good projects to participate.
Yeh Hsin Tsan Kaichuan Planning Design Co. Ltd, Taiwan
I’m very honoured to have been invited as a member of the Panel of Jury as this is a prestigious award in Malaysia and renowned for its stringent judging process. Being an architect myself, I wish to see more cultural values being incorporated into the overall design of the project. Evaluators
Syah Kamaruddin Veritas Design Group
I enjoyed being an evaluator for it gave me a great opportunity to learn how the developers push the project to the public. It has indeed been an eye-opening experience for me.
Kiko Lam Hooi Li Orientis Solutions Sdn Bhd
For developers, the Award being the Oscar award of the industry, serves as a great recognition to them.
Teoh Wee Tat Mah Sing Group
This prestigious award assesses the completed projects. It is very thorough, independent and special compared to other accolades.
Azril Jaafar Veritas Design Group
I think that the developers have to give more attention to the details. They have to be more straightforward in terms of the merit of the project. The submissions have to stress on the merit based on the criteria.