BTO: Roxy-Pacific buys 37 Kovan Centre units

Business Times - 20 Jun 2009

Roxy-Pacific buys 37 Kovan Centre units

By KALPANA RASHIWALA

ROXY-PACIFIC has bought 37 freehold strata retail units at Kovan Centre at Yio Chu Kang Road for $22.2 million, or about $540 per sq ft from Ho Bee.

The units are on the first and second levels of the four-storey commercial and residential development, which also has a 69-lot basement carpark.

Ho Bee bought the asset from First Capital Corporation (now GuocoLand) in 1999 for $18.8 million. Colliers International brokered the latest sale to Roxy-Pacific through a private treaty deal.

The space involved has a total strata area of 41,129 sq ft. It represents about a 90 per cent share value in the entire development and 64 per cent of its floor area.

Roxy-Pacific said it intends to improve the asset's current rental income, with the possibility of selling it at an appropriate time.

Market watchers say one scenario for Roxy could be to team up with the owners of the apartments on the third and fourth levels of the development to do a collective sale.

The Kovan Centre is on a site zoned for residential and commercial use with a 3.0 plot ratio - the ratio of maximum potential gross floor area to land area - under Master Plan 2008.

Roxy-Pacific said it expects to complete the purchase in the third quarter of this year.