High Point relaunched for collective sale at $550 mil

SINGAPORE (EDGEPROP) - High Point, a freehold condominium block at 30 Mount Elizabeth, has been launched for public tender at a guide price of $550 million. Savills has been appointed as the marketing agent.

According to the consultant, the guide price works out to $2,508 psf per plot ratio (psf ppr) after factoring in the 7% bonus gross floor area (GFA) for balconies. The price takes into account the $18.8 million development charge for the balconies.

The launch marks High Point’s fourth attempt at a collective sale, and also comes nearly three months after Hong Kong-listed Shun Tak Holdings aborted its purchase of High Point following the last collective sale attempt.

High Point had previously launched for collective sale in October last year, also at a guide price of $550 million. On Dec 9, 2021, Shun Tak announced it had won the bid for $556.688 million or $2,626 psf ppr. However, just a fortnight later, Shun Tak backed out of the deal, forfeiting its $1 million tender deposit. Property observers attributed Shun Tak’s withdrawal from the deal to the property cooling measures announced on Dec 16, 2021 (See: Why Shun Tak aborted the en bloc purchase of High Point).

Jeremy Lake, managing director, investment sales & capital markets at Savills, believes the time is now ripe to relaunch the property for collective sale. “A few developers have been monitoring High Point with us over the last few weeks and we feel that it is timely to relaunch the public tender now to give developers ample time to evaluate the opportunity,” he says in a March 21 statement.

However, the tender closing date has yet to be set. Lake says this will only be done once confirmed interest has been received from at least one developer. “This is somewhat similar to the URA Reserve List approach to selling sites,” he remarks.

Prior to its collective sale launch last October, High Point had previously been launched for sale in January 2019, also at an asking price of $550 million. Its first collective sale attempt was in 2007, though that was aborted as it failed to secure the requisite 80% consensus.

High Point sits on a 47,606 sq ft residential site. Completed in 1974, the existing development has 22 storeys with a total GFA of 211,976 sq ft based on a plot ratio of 4.45.

Under the URA Master Plan 2019, the site has an allowable gross plot ratio of 2.8 and height control of up to 36 storeys. The URA development baseline is approximately 213,383 sq ft with a plot ratio of 4.48. The site is not subjected to a pre-application feasibility study on traffic impact.

According to Savills, the site can be redeveloped into a luxury tower with 98 units at an average size of approximately 2,153 sq ft each.

“High Point represents a truly unique opportunity for developers to create an iconic ultra-luxurious development befitting the property’s site excellent attributes,” says Galven Tan, Savills' deputy managing director, investment sales & capital markets.

Located in the Orchard Road residential area, the site is a seven-minute walk away from Orchard Road MRT Station.