In the same period, the property-development company posted a net profit of Bt974 million, up 6 per cent from Bt919 million from last year's first nine months.

For the third quarter alone, the company earned total revenues of Bt1.713 billion, down 14 per cent from last year's Bt2 billion. As a result, the third-quarter net profit amounted to Bt257 million, down 27 per cent from last year's Bt351 million, CEO and managing director Thongma Vijitpongpun said in a press statement.

"We are confident we'll be able to generate much greater sales in the final quarter of the year than in the third quarter, because we're launching five new projects during this period, even though they were earlier planned for launch in 2007," said Thongma.

The five projects, all offering town houses in a price range of Bt600,000 to Bt1.7 million a unit, will be developed on Kingkaew Road, at Bang Na-Trat Road Km 10, in Bang Khunthien and Lam Luk Ka districts and on Pracha-uthit Road. As a mass-market developer, Preuksa is well known for offering cheap housing units.

"The five new projects will be our very first in two new promising locations: Bang Na-Suvarnabhumi and Rama II-Pracha-uthit. The new projects will extend our network of quality residential developments t0o cover more of both the eastern and southern areas of Bangkok, in order to cope with ever-increasing demand in the foreseeable future," Thongma concluded.