Jul 24, 2012 - By: iProperty.com
Many Singaporeans often prefer the slick andstylish designs of new properties; however Mr Getty Goh, Director of AscendantAssets, a local boutique research consultancy, has always had a penchant for olderproperties.
“Whenever I look for a property, I will alwaystry to go for the old units. In fact,the older they are the better. I like old properties mainly because they giveme an opportunity to do it up just the way I like it”, said Getty.
Apart from allowing him to exercise hiscreativity, another reason why Getty prefers older properties is because they havea greater “value for money” proposition, and are thus potentially betterinvestments than spanking new properties.
“When I was writing my second book, Buy RIGHT Property, my research team andI wanted to find out whether new sale units or resale units were more value formoney. Intuitively, we expected new saleunits to be pricier than older resale units; however the question was how bigwas the difference?”
According to research from Getty’s book, themedian price of private properties that were completed in 1980 and 2009 were$499psf and $1,278psf respectively. Hence for the same amount, buyers couldpotentially get more value when they purchase an older property from the resalemarket.
With Getty’s preference in older properties, aparticular passion of his is pre-war conservation shop houses. “I had alwayswanted to try living in a pre-war shophouse. I was very fortunate that the dream eventually became a reality when Ipurchase one such unit along East Coast in 2010.”
As the unit was in the original condition,extensive renovation on the unit had to be done. Despite the scale of the work, the cost ofrenovation amounted to slightly over $100,000 and the time taken for therenovation works was only 6 weeks.
“Many of my friends, who had been to myshop-house, were surprised to find out that the whole renovation process took sucha short time. Many of them had done somerenovation work on their own homes before and knew how long drawn the processcould get. They would frequently ask me how I did it and I would always tellthem to hire a reliable contractor. Peopleare often reluctant to pay for a good contractor and go for the one with thelowest quote. However, I feel that it ismore important to find someone reliable. Even though some of these reliablecontractors may not be cheap, ultimately you can be assured of the quality aswell as the timeliness of the renovation work.”
While staying in a prewar conservation shop housecan be appealing, it is not without some disadvantages. Getty shared that one of the main disadvantageshe faced was the lack of parking spaces. Hence, these properties might notappeal to families that have more than one car.
With only a handful of shop-houses around, Gettyfeels that he was very fortunate to have stayed in one. “For those who have the chance to stay in ashophouse, I would strongly recommend that you give it a try. Conservationshophouses have been around since the pre-war days and is part of Singapore’sheritage. Ultimately, staying in one wouldprobably be one of the most “Uniquely Singapore” experience anyone can get.”
