The country’s property market is expected to perform way above and beyond all expectations, as it continues its spectacular growth during the first quarter of this year.
Records from the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) show the sector’s price index soaring by 9.2 percent (8 percent, inflation-adjusted). Quarter on quarter, the index was seen rising 1.9 percent during the same period.
Analysts also see the sector’s big growth potential in Davao City owing to the present government’s focus on spurring economic upturn in the country’s southern region.
Davao-based Yuson Comm Investments President and CEO Frederick Yuson told BusinessWise that the industry’s rosy prediction is based on the economy’s projected growth by 6 percent this year and 6.2 percent in 2017, from the GDP’s growth rates of 5.8 percent in 2015, 6.1 percent in 2014, 7 percent in 2013 and 6.7
percent in 2012.
“The ascension of former Davao City Mayor Rodrigo R. Duterte to the presidency has shifted investors’ interest from Manila to our province. With various infrastructure projects lined up to spur Davao’s growth, everyone here is very optimistic that our province will finally be in the forefront of the country’s economic progress,” Yuson said, adding that “the economic progress of the Philippines provides a foundation for further sustainable growth to fully realize the Philippines’s enormous potential.”
Yuson said the inclusion of Davao among the 10 Next Wave Cities in business process outsourcing (BPO) augurs well for the province. The BPO industry is mainly driven by the health-care sector that accounted for more than 100,000 employees.
According to Danilo Sebastian Reyes, chairman of the Information Technology and Business Process Association of the Philippines, the other cities in the list are: Baguio City, Dumaguete, Iloilo, Lipa, Metro Bulacan, Metro Cavite, Metro Laguna, Metro Naga, and Metro Rizal.
Yuson cited other economic factors that will propel the country to continued growth: “Last year, fixed capital investment grew 25.5 percent, and contributed 5.8 percentage points to real GDP growth; construction grew 12 percent, up from growth rates of 7.6 percent in the previous quarter, and 4.5 percent in a year earlier. In fact, public construction expanded by 39.9 percent, in sharp contrast to a 23 percent decline a year earlier; and exports rose by 6.6 percent, while imports grew by 15.9 percent. In addition, election-related spending buoyed domestic demand through May 2016, when the national and sub-national elections were held.
“All these factors give us confidence that the economy will continue to perform well in the succeeding quarters of the year and beyond.”
Today Cebu Landmasters will sign a Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) with Yuson Comm Investments of the prominent Villa-Abrille clan in Davao City.
The three projects include a mid-market condo conveniently located at E. Jacinto that will be preselling by January 2017, as well as a Riverside Mixed-Use project along the McArthur Highway, and a Times Beach Lifestyle Mixed-Use project in Matina, which are both in the pipeline.
The E. Jacinto Mid-Market Condo will be a 15-story midrise structure with two buildings. It will offer an affordable pricing scheme for the midmarket, with a premium condominium concept similar to Cebu Landmasters’s Mesaverte Residences in Cagayan de Oro, and Midori Residences and Mivesa Garden Residences in Cebu.
Targeted for completion in 2018, Cebu Landmasters Mesaverte Residences in Cagayan de Oro is now 85 percent sold. Midori Residences in Cebu is now sold out, while the Mivesa Garden Residences holds the distinction for being the fastest-selling condo in Cebu.
The 1.9-hectare Riverside Mixed-Use Project in McArthur Highway will meanwhile feature BPO offices, a residential condo, serviced residences (or condotel) and retail commercial areas. Eyed as an exciting addition to Davao’s lifestyle scene is the four-hectare Times Beach project in Matina. The masterplan of the Times Beach and Riverside properties will be designed by globally renowned design consultancy firm CallisonRTKL, which has produced some of the world’s most memorable and thriving, living and commercial spaces in the past five decades.
“This is Cebu Landmasters’s very first venture in Davao, and we are very proud that these prime properties have been entrusted to us by the Yuson-Villa-Abille family. This will be a great collaboration and exciting venture for both of us,” CLI Senior Vice President and Chief Operations Officer Jose Franco B. Soberano added.
Yuson expressed full confidence in the success of each project. “We share the same values, passion and commitment to community development with Cebu Landmasters, which is one of the leading and multi-awarded real-estate developers in the Visayas and Mindanao regions,” he said.
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