The shophouse at 182 Joo Chiat Road, with the former Ang Moh Noodle House on the first level, is up for sale at $14.5 million (Photo: Albert Chua/The Edge Singapore)
Today, as the Goh family prepares to sell its shophouse at 182 Joo Chiat Road, their story echoes the area’s transformation. The family’s roots in the East Coast trace back to 1947, when patriarch Goh Tiew Ann began as a fishmonger.
According to the company’s history, he would wake at 3am each morning to cycle to the former Joo Chiat Pier — now part of the reclaimed land at Marine Parade — to buy fishermen’s early-morning catch. He then pedalled back to his stall at the former Joo Chiat Market (today’s Joo Chiat Complex) to sell the fish.
After enduring countless downpours on these rides, Goh came up with the idea of selling umbrellas. When his stall closed at 10am, he spent his afternoons repairing and crafting umbrellas, which he supplied to nearby shops. The umbrella business grew so quickly that he eventually gave up fishmongering to become a full-time umbrella manufacturer. He named the company Ming Say Holdings, now known as MS1947.
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Former fishmonger turned umbrella manufacturer, Goh Tiew Ann, the founder of Ming Say Holdings (Photo: Website of MS1947)
Around the early 1950s, Goh purchased a 2½-storey shophouse at 186 Joo Chiat Road, which housed the company’s first factory. The row of post-war shophouses had been newly built by a property developer.
By the early 1970s, the business expanded into a second shophouse at 182 Joo Chiat Road, situated two doors away. The freehold shophouse came with the back lane, which occupied a land area of about 4,163.5 sq ft.
The 4,163.5 sq ft back lane that belongs to the shop unit at 182 Joo Chiat Road (Photo: Albert Chua/The Edge Singapore)
“The original developer had pegged the lane to the shophouse at 182 Joo Chiat Road,” says Johnny Goh, COO of MS1947. “We used the back lane as part of our factory — I remember we used to sun our umbrellas there.”
Johnny, one of the founder’s sons, joined the family business as general manager in 1981. His elder brother, Stewart Goh, the company CEO, had joined in January 1970. With both brothers taking the helm, the firm entered its second generation of leadership. Today, members of the third generation have stepped in, too.
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Beyond Joo Chiat, the company expanded into a factory at Senang Crescent in the 1970s. In the 1980s, their father and a relative who joined the business went their separate ways. The Goh family sold their shophouse at 186 Joo Chiat Road, and opened a new, larger factory at Eunos. However, they retained the shophouse at 182 Joo Chiat Road, which remains their corporate headquarters.
Including the back lane, the shopouse at 182 Joo Chiat Road occupies a total land area of 5,691 sq ft (Source: EdgeProp Landlens)
By the 1990s, the business had expanded overseas with a factory in Xiamen, China. From its humble beginnings, Ming Say diversified into luxury umbrellas, outdoor parasols, shade systems and eco-friendly outdoor furniture. In the 2010s, it rebranded as MS1947, honouring its founding year.
Another business whose history is intertwined with that of the Goh family’s in Joo Chiat is Ang Moh Noodle House, which occupied the ground floor of 182 Joo Chiat Road since the early 2000s.
The noodle brand was said to have been started decades earlier by Ao Yang, born to a British soldier father and a Chinese mother — a mixed parentage that gave him distinctly Caucasian features. Customers began referring to his stall as “Ang Moh wanton mee”, and the name endured.
Ang Moh Noodle House had occupied the space since the early 2000s, until it closed in August last year (Photo: Albert Chua/The Edge Singapore)
“Ang Moh Noodle House has a rich history going back to the 1960s in the Joo Chiat area,” says Johnny. “It started as a push-cart stall with no name before becoming Ang Moh Wanton Noodles.”
Over the years, the business moved from Joo Chiat Road to Joo Chiat Place and Tembeling Road. The previous operator at 182 Joo Chiat Road was a protégé of the founder. After running Ang Moh Noodle House for about a decade, he retired for health reasons. Johnny’s elder brother, Stewart, decided to take over the business in 2012.
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“Because of the brand’s rich heritage, we decided to buy and take over the brand and original recipe to preserve its continuity — and also because we loved the Ang Moh Wanton Noodle taste,” says Johnny.
After 13 years, Ang Moh Noodle House closed at the end of August this year. “The wanton noodle shop is no longer operating due to staff shortages,” says Johnny. “We also want to streamline our businesses due to age, and the younger generation is not interested in continuing this business.”
With the noodle house’s closure, the Goh family is putting 182 Joo Chiat Road on the market. The 2½-storey freehold shophouse, with a four-storey rear extension, has a built-up area of about 4,700 sq ft and is priced at $14.5 million, or $3,085 psf based on the existing built-up area. Its land area totals 5,691 sq ft, including the sizeable back lane.
Loyalle Chin, director of PropNex ShophouseHuat and founder of Steward, and John Gaw, senior associate division director of PropNex, are the exclusive agents for the property, which is offered for sale by private treaty. Chin has also secured approval from the owners of 184, 186 and 188 Joo Chiat Road to sell their shophouses collectively with No. 182 — a four-property portfolio with a guide price of $45 million. Like No. 182, these properties are 2½-storey shophouses with four-storey rear extensions.
According to Chin, a buyer who acquires all four shophouses can potentially redevelop the rear extensions up to 5½-storeys. The properties, including the back lane, are zoned ‘Commercial’ with a plot ratio of 3.0.
A new 5½-storey rear block could accommodate co-living or serviced apartments under the SA2 category, which requires a minimum stay of three months, subject to approval.
The two-storey corner shophouse that fetched $12.5 million, or $3,641 psf, last month (Photo: Loyalle Chin/Seward)
The sale of 182 Joo Chiat Road comes as the neighbourhood undergoes another wave of renewal.
Property values have risen along with its reputation as one of Singapore’s most colourful cultural corridors, where long-time family businesses like the Goh family’s MS1947 coexist with a new generation of lifestyle concepts.
In 3Q2025, District 15 (Katong-Joo Chiat) led shophouse sales, with eight transactions totalling $47.9 million, according to PropNex Research’s Oct 27 report. This was a 50% increase from the previous quarter’s 18 deals, although the figure could be higher when transactions without lodged caveats are accounted for.
Overall, shophouse transactions hit $210 million in 3Q2025 — 65.3% higher than the previous quarter and the strongest quarterly performance in two years.
Chin’s team at Steward recently brokered the sale of a two-storey corner shophouse at 213 East Coast Road, which sits on 1,867 sq ft of land with a built-up area of about 3,433 sq ft. It recently fetched $12.5 million, or $3,641 psf.
Another shophouse at 207 East Coast Road was formerly home to Katong Baby & Child Clinic and Katong Eye Clinic for 35 years. It was put up for sale after the doctors’ retirement. The shophouse changed hands for $10 million in December 2024, with the deal brokered by Chin’s team.
The shophouse that housed the Loh's family medical practice for 35 years sold for $10 milllion in December 2024 (Photo: Samuel Isaac Chua/EdgeProp Singapore)
The new owner of the shophouse at 207 East Coast Road has leased the property to Bfit, a sports physiotherapy, rehab and gym operator.
Earlier this month (November), Chagee opened a new outlet on East Coast Road in Katong, opposite the I12 Mall (Photo: Loyalle Chin/Steward)
In recent years, long-time family-run businesses in the area have given way to a new wave of cafés, pet-related businesses, and lifestyle operators. “In the Katong–Joo Chiat stretch today, you’ll find new F&B stores including Chagee, cat cafés, dog hotels, as well as numerous veterinary clinics and groomers,” Chin notes. “Thus, Joo Chiat is voted one of the world’s coolest streets in 2025.”
New lifestyle and pet concepts that have opened in Joo Chiat include pet hotel Breakfast at Fluffy's (Photo: Albert Chua/The Edge Singapore)
The precinct’s footfall has surged, supported by new condominiums such as the 843-unit Seaside Residences, 592-unit Amber Park, and 200-unit Meyer Mansion, completed in recent years. Over the next few years, additional supply — including the 638-unit Tembusu Grand, 846-unit Emerald of Katong, 816-unit The Continuum and the 1,008-unit Grand Dunman — is expected to inject more residents into the area.
Under the 2025 Draft Master Plan, the government has earmarked the new Bayshore precinct as a waterfront urban village with around 12,500 new homes, both public and private. This brings the total upcoming residential pipeline in the wider East Coast area to an estimated 16,034 homes over the next three to five years.
New hotels have opened up in Joo Chiat, including the Sakura Hotel (Photo: Albert Chua/The Edge Singapore)
“We therefore anticipate further gentrification in the Joo Chiat precinct, attracting a deeper pool of reputable F&B and lifestyle operators to serve an increasingly affluent catchment,” says Chin. “In our view, 182 Joo Chiat Road stands out as a compelling opportunity for private capital, family business owners and institutional investors seeking strategic exposure to the next phase of growth in Katong.”
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