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Published on March 7, 2008

TCC Land Co Ltd, the property arm of beverage tycoon Charoen Sirivad-hanabhakdi, is looking at establishing a property fund with Bt10 billion worth of its overseas properties.

"We have to start up a property fund at the end of this year or next year to support our aggressive investment plans for this year and the next 10 years from now," director Soammaphat Traisorat said yesterday.

 The company will raise capital abroad by transferring or selling its overseas properties, especially hotels and resorts, to the property fund.

"We cannot say when we will launch the property fund because we have to wait and see how the sub-prime mortgage crisis in the US turns out.

"If the sub-prime problem lingers, we might delay this plan.  If it ends quickly, we're all ready to open the fund because we need capital to invest in our new property projects especially our residential and resort project in the Cha-am resort town in Phetchaburi," he said.

TCC Land's real estate in the US, the UK, Malaysia, Singapore, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam and China generate returns on investment of 9-10 per cent, so they will be good assets to back the property fund, said Soammaphat, who is the son-in-law of Charoen.

The company has set aside an investment budget of nearly Bt10 billion for this year.

Of that, Bt8 billion will be used to develop seven hotels in Bangkok and upcountry, Bt800 million to buy the Nation Tower on Bang Na-Trad Road and Bt500 million to take over the Majestic hotel and golf course in Prachuap Khiri Khan's Hua Hin resort area. The remaining Bt700 million would go to renovate both existing properties.

Of the seven new hotels, two will be budget hotels offering room rates from Bt700-Bt1,000 per night under the "Imm" brand. The first hotel, with 180 rooms, will be located in Chiang Mai, and the other one in Bangkok on Sukhumvit Soi 50.

The other five hotels will be luxury hotels. Two will be located in Chiang Mai, the next two in Koh Samui and the last in Bangkok on Sukhumvit Soi 24.

For Cha-am Resort Town, the company will develop only its infrastructure such as the main road and water system on 12,000 rai of land, of which 4,000 rai will be a lake supplying water for the project.

This work will cost several billions of baht. Then the company will go on a roadshow to interest foreign investors into developing the five golf links and residential projects.

"We changed the plan from developing a theme park to a residential complex because we were concerned about the environment and believed that the residential resort concept will better for this property," he said.

The company also will develop a luxury hotel as part of the EAC Warehouse Master Plan for the area near the Chao Phya River. 

Somluck Srimalee

The Nation