Published on June 12, 2006 - Top builder draws mid-income buyers

Asian Property Develop-ment remains one of the busiest home-builders today, having diversified from constructing town houses and condominiums into building single detached houses and home offices.

With a score of ongoing and new projects at hand, Asian Property CEO Anuphong Assavabhokin said the target of the company remained the middle-class buyer.

"In the current market, which is strongly influenced by higher oil prices, higher interest rates and a slowdown in the economy, we are focusing on products that can sell - meaning units that are in demand," he said.

"It is clear the market conditions today do not favour luxury projects. To tap the real demand, we have to understand what buyers today want and what they can afford."

Unrealistic pricing and the designing of units few people can afford are two ways of courting disaster, he added.

To power new campaigns offering low-interest incentives, Anuphong has recruited veteran players like marketing chief Visanu Suchatlumpong, formerly with Golden Land and Land & Houses, and corporate planner Pumipat Sinacharoen.

Asian Property's homes - whether they are town houses or condominiums - are for the most part priced at about Bt3 million to Bt4 million, said the top executives.

Anuphong, an avid globetrotter, likes to bring a personal touch to his endeavours. He takes photographs of places he visits, mostly buildings and landscapes. Upon returning home, he infuses the parts he likes into his projects.

As a result, he has today named half a dozen town-house sites under the specific city they are inspired by. There is Baan Klang Muang Rachada Monte Carlo, a 27-rai estate with 261 units of three-floor homes selling from Bt4.5 million.

Other Baan Klang Muang sites are Grande De Paris on Rachavipha, and Luzern on Soi Onnuj 46 near Srinakarin.

Asian Property's Baan Klang Krung on Rama III has facades based on Viennese buildings. Its Klang Krung office site on Bang Na at kilometre 2 is named after San Francisco, and the other in Lat Phrao is attributed to Sydney. The first project sells home offices for Bt5 million, while the second is priced at Bt6 million.

Foreign shareholders are strong supporters as they like the company's performance, said Anuphong, who was last year named "Best CEO" in the Asia category by New York-based Institutional Investor bankers' magazine.

The firm was also recently voted "best managed" small company by Euromoney magazine.

What distinguishes Anuphong from many local developers is that he is a professional player and committed to delivering to buyers the homes he sells. While others like to dilly-dally and postpone completion - sometimes by a year or more - Anuphong is seldom late and transfers units in the shortest time possible.

It is this style of conducting transactions that allows the firm to grow at twice the speed of other firms. It can inject cash from completed projects to make new acquisitions for new projects, thus boosting earnings further. Local banks are key supporters, with Siam Commercial Bank offering attractive mortgage terms to buyers in the current sales campaign.

Anuphong is confident of achieving a 30-per-cent rise in earnings from the previous year. Last year the company obtained about Bt4 billion from its core real estate business. This year, the target is about Bt5 billion.

The company is also keen to start more city condominiums, as higher oil prices and the worsening traffic situation is shifting people away from the suburbs.

"More urban workers now want to avoid spending two to four hours every day commuting to work," he noted. "The cost of petrol is so high now, and it could go higher. That it makes it costly to drive from the outer suburbs, which are already becoming very congested."

The Bang Na-Sukhumvit intersection and expressway is now often paralysed for two hours or more. Such trends favours the shift to inner-city homes, provided they are affordable, he said.

Although pollution robs inner-city inhabitants of a portion of their life span, the trade-off is they have a better quality of life. They have more leisure time to spend, not being trapped for hours on the roads, Anuphong said. They also suffer less stress, considered by doctors as "the quiet killer" that brings on a number of deadly ailments.

Also, they save massive amounts of money. By not having to buy cars, they also save on vehicle fees, insurance and taxes, not to mention petrol bills.

In the near future, Asian Property will seek to tap this trend, said the CEO.

Anuphong is the youngest son of the Assavabhokhin family, whose eldest son Anant runs the country's biggest property firm, Land & Houses.

But the two firms are run independently. Today, Land & Houses owns no shares in Asian Property, Anupong said.

The executive holds an MBA from Michigan State University and is frequently called upon by leading universities to conduct lectures and classes.

Itthi C Tan
The Nation