Habitat hunts for buyers in Bangkok
Pattaya-based developer Habitat Group is focusing on the Bangkok property market, planning to launch four new projects here and one in Pattaya this year worth over 4 billion baht.
One of the Bangkok sites will be a super-luxury housing project, Leroy Ruamrudee, on Ruamrudee Soi 2, comprising two seven-storey duplex houses. Each will be located on a 60-square-wah plot with a usable area of 1,000 square metres, an elevator and a swimming pool.
“There is demand for low-rise houses in the central business district among wealthy families whose businesses are in the inner city. They prefer living downtown,” said chief executive Chanin Vanijwongse. “Our project is targeting customers who have two to three generations living together.”
He said the project appeals to a niche market with a limited number of players, as most supply of this kind — superluxury houses with fewer than 10 units per site — are in the Sukhumvit area.
On Chidlom, Phloenchit, Lang Suan and Wireless roads, almost all residential supply is condominiums and most are priced at 300,000 baht per sq m or more.
The other three projects in Bangkok will be low-rise condominiums under the Walden brand, located on Sukhumvit Sois 23, 31 and 39. Each will have fewer than 100 units priced at 170,000-220,000 baht per sq m.
Mr Chanin said the shift to the Bangkok property market requires more funding than property development in Pattaya, as investment costs in the capital are significantly higher.
In Pattaya, the company spends 40-100 million baht per rai to acquire land for property development. The comparable figure in Bangkok is 300-400 million baht per rai.
“For our four years in the property business, we have grown with our own cash flow,” Mr Chanin said. “As we move to Bangkok from this year onwards and focus on the upper-end segment, we will need other sources of finance.”
Mr Chanin said seeking a listing on the Market for Alternative Investment (MAI) will be a must for the firm to raise funds.
Habitat hopes to raise funds through the MAI by 2020, he said.
Habitat expects to have 3 billion baht in presales by the end of 2018, up from 1.3 billion last year and 666 million in 2016. The company had a sales backlog of 2.1 billion baht at the end of 2017, of which 500 million will be realised this year.
Habitat Group was incorporated in 2012 with a mission to become one of Thailand’s leading property developers in the upper-mid-scale and luxury residential market.
The company’s first development was The Ville Jomtien, launched in Pattaya in the first quarter of 2013.