Rare hotel/coffeeshop shophouse in Geylang up for sale

A highly sought after shophouse unit in 549 Geylang Road is up for sale by the exclusive marketing agent, Tommy Ng from PropNex. The shophouse is a corner unit with a wide frontage and is currently tenanted by the popular Xing Lian Eating House coffeeshop on the ground level and Yew Lian Hotel on top of it. Spanning over three stories, the hotel has a total of 18 rooms and has a rare transit hotel licence, which means that it can charge an hourly hotel rate.

Local foodies must surely be familiar with Swee Guan Hokkien Mee, said to be one of Singapore’s best with its noodles fried over charcoal, and served with large prawns and smoky broth. Housed inside Sing Lian Eating House coffeeshop, this stall is just one of the popular stalls among six of them at 549 Geylang Road. The others include Kwong Satay and Hup Kee Fried Oyster.

While Geylang may be popular for being home to several of Singapore’s best food, it is known as a red-light district. However, 549 Geylang Road is located in a “green light” area and is clear of any vice activity. It is also located in one of the busiest stretches of Geylang where several other famous eateries, restaurants and hair salons can be found. Hence, obtaining a loan for the purchase of this property should not be an issue.

Singapore’s Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) has also zoned this property as fully commercial, which means that both foreigners and locals are able to purchase this property.

Currently going for $21 million, this freehold property’s total build up comes up to about 6,600 sq ft. Its $3,182 psf price tag is a rather enticing one for a shophouse lot, considering some of the current transactions for shophouses within the central & Kampong Glam areas of Singapore today reaching over $6,000 psf for similar sized units.

This hard to come by shophouse asset is located in the eastern central part of Singapore and is a few minutes’ drive from the central business district (CBD) area and Bugis. Furthermore, the area is also surrounded by private condominiums, landed estate enclaves, F&B establishments, new Build-To-Order (BTO) flats by Singapore’s Housing Development Board (HDB), which ensures a steady footfall.

When the current owners first purchased this property back in March 2013, they envisioned the coffeeshop and hotel combination that occupies the current property. Hence, they had secured both an F&B and hotel licence from the relevant authorities. While the licenses were secured, the owners have also renovated the hotel rooms to realise its income-generating potential.

The way they see it, they have indeed captured this opportunity and realised the value of this property. Even during the pandemic, they were enjoying monthly revenues of high five-figures from the current coffeeshop tenants and hotel operations. And now that Singapore is reopening, the owners are predicting for this to increase.

Alas, the current owners are looking to sell this property. They had acquired the property previously from Ng, who is a senior associate division director from Propnex who specialises in shophouses. Today, Ng is once again back at this property and looking for the next owner. As the exclusive agent for this sale, Ng says that 549 Geylang Road will be sold via expressions of interest (EOI) until Aug 18.