Filinvest wins bid for Cebu property

GOTIANUN-LED property developer Filinvest Land Inc. won the bidding for a 19.2-hectare reclaimed land at South Road Properties (SRP) in Cebu City's east coast, expanding its footprint in what is envisioned to be a new central business district.

In a disclosure to the Philippine Stock Exchange on Wednesday, FLI said it—together with its subsidiaries and affiliates—won the bidding conducted by the Cebu City government for Lot No. 1 (consolidated portions of Lots 7 and 17) at the SRP.

The property will be developed and owned by FLI—the first property firm to invest in Cebu City’s SRP project—together with its office development subsidiary, Cyberzone Properties, Inc., its central business district affiliate, Filinvest Alabang Inc. and other possible strategic partners, the disclosure said.

“The property will be developed in accordance with the required minimum development plans of the Cebu City government as specified in the bidding guidelines, wherein 70 percent of the buildable area is intended for commercial and/or office use and the remaining 30 percent for residential use,” FLI said.

“The new development will complement the ongoing ‘City di Mare’ project of FLI in SRP,” the property firm added.

Unlike FLI’s original landbank at the SRP where the city kept a 10-percent economic interest in the development, these new batches of reclaimed land were being disposed by the city government through an outright sale.

FLI’s P25-billion mixed-use estate “City di Mare” in SRP is its largest real estate development in this city.

The group is bullish on this SRP area, believing that urban development in Cebu City—the country’s most important city next to Metro Manila—would eventually gravitate toward this brand new development.

SRP is a 300-hectare reclamation project of the city government, out of which 240 hectares had so far been reclaimed.

In the same area, the SM group of tycoon Henry Sy Sr. is developing a separate 30hectare property.

SM, in partnership with Ayala Land, also bagged a new 26hectare landbank in SRP with a winning bid of P10 billion.