Home builder lifts prices

This will become effective in June, managing director Vichai Kongsriong said.

He added that the company had to increase its prices following a rise in raw-material costs of between 5 and 7 per cent since last year.

"We tried to maintain the existing price although our costs have been rising. We can no longer absorb the costs that are reducing our net profit from 15 per cent to 10 per cent. As a result we have decided to increase our prices in June," he said.

Four Develop House is a subsidiary of Four Pattana. The company focuses on the middle market with housing prices between Bt3 million and Bt4 million per unit.

The company estimated sales would be Bt75 million at the end of this year, or 25-per-cent growth from last year, but may reduce its sales target this year, since many landowners are delaying their decision to construct new houses while their cost of living is rising, Vichai said.

However, the company believes that its sales in the first half of this year will reach Bt35 million after the first four months of this year recorded sales of nearly Bt25 million.

Vichai added that the company's net profit this year may be lower than 10 per cent.

"We cannot say our net profit will keep up with last year because our costs are rising. However we tried to reduce costs by using a marketing campaign with our parent company and are trying to reduce construction expenses. That may help us to maintain our net profit at 8-10 per cent this year," he said.

To maintain its sales and net profit, the company plans to launch three new housing models to focus on customers who want to build new houses to replace existing

ones. The new models can be constructed on land areas of 60-70 square wah.