4% economic growth seen to benefit property sector

Despite the uncertainties of the political exercise come May and the absence of statistics to support last year’s growth of four percent, property developer One Asia Development Corp. is optimistic that this growth rate will be maintained this year and will continue to benefit the property sector.

One Asia president Victor H. Manarang said the slowing down of the manufacturing sector is somewhat being balanced off by the robust performance of the services sector which is being further propped up by election spending.

For one, the low cost and middle range market housing sector will continue to grow at three to four percent overall with its increasing access to home financing. Socialized housing also has enough room for bigger growth this year because funds are being made available for such projects, he said.

The high-end sector has, for the last two years, shown signs of recovering from the doldrums of the late nineties, which saw a huge inventory of high-end projects that are market could not absorb.

Manarang said that for the past two years, "the market has slowly but surely been absorbing whatever excess supply of high-rise projects and high-end condominium units were left from 1996 onwards and new projects are now being started by developers like us."

He said there is always room for developers to realize growth in their operations this year by going to the "under-served" areas.

Organized in July 2000, One Asia is the developer of The Celebrity Place, a P1-billion townhouse and walk-up condominium project in Diliman, Quezon City. It just launched last week its newest project called Verdant Heights in Parañaque City.

Verdant Heights covers a 3.38 hectares land property owned by Atlanta Land Corp. within the Multinational Village in Parañaque City. The P300-million development is being spearheaded by One Asia as project developer, while International Exchange Bank (Ibank) serves as the financial adviser and lender.

It is a well-planned residential enclave boasting of stylish and functional single-detached and single attached house and lots and townhouse clusters in a beautifully landscaped and well-secured environment.

There are a total of 216 units for sale, of which 138 are townhouses; 65 single attached and 13 single detached houses and lots.

One Asia’s sister outfit Earth+Style Corp. caters to middle to high end projects in Laguna and Cavite.

Three other outfits affiliated with One Asia are undertaking the socialized and low cost housing development namely: 18-year old Extraordinary Development Corp.; Acer Homes Development (which is the only developer in Montalban covering an underserved area) and Tahanang Yaman (which began development last year in Gen. Trias, Cavite).

Manarang said 70 to 80 percent of the government’s funding for housing project goes to socialized and low cost housing developments while 20 to 30 percent is for middle housing projects.