Investors Leong and Tang Put HK$12.5B in Hong Kong Properties Up for Sale

Two of Hong Kong’s best known real estate investors were revealed this week to have put a total of over HK$12 billion ($1.5 billion) worth of local properties on the market, leading to speculation over the market outlook of the two property veterans.

“Shop kings” Tang Shing-bor and Edwin Leong Siu-hung are making available by tender sale a total of 35 properties, local media reported. The planned property disposals include shops, residential buildings, offices, malls and even construction sites across Hong Kong Island, Kowloon and the New Territories.

Leong Said Changing Investment Strategy

Representatives of property consultancy Savills, which is representing Leong’s Tai Hung Fai Group in marketing its portfolio of properties, explained to Hong Kong local media on Tuesday that the property developer was putting the assets on the market as part of a change in his investment strategy.

In all, Tai Hung Fai Group has put 23 assets on the block worth an estimated HK$4.5 billion. The properties are being sold in four separate tender sales according to their locations, with bids for the tender due on October 10th.

The majority of the assets being made available are shops, including over 60 units in the Sim CIty shopping mall on Shantung Street in Mong Kok, as well as individual shops in places like Kennedy Town, Aberdeen, Happy Valley, North Point and Chai Wan. The company is also making available an office unit on an upper level of the Bank of America Tower in Admiralty.

Sai Ying Pun Project Set to Cost HK$10B

The real estate tycoon’s planned disposal of the assets comes just less than three months after he had acquired the Butterfly on Waterfront Hotel in Hong Kong’s Sai Ying Pun area.

The property investor has declared a plan to combine the boutique hotel site with several other properties he had acquired earlier on the same block to create the Des Voeux Commercial Centre on Des Voeux Road West.

Leong has declared previously that his company will invest some HK$10 billion to build the 400,000 square foot grade A office building on the Sai Ying Pun site — two MTR stops west of Central.

Picking Old Cherries

While the HK$12 billion value of the properties being put on the market commands attention, Colliers International deputy managing director Antonio Wu cautioned that potential buyers may have to sort through the collection of assets carefully to find opportunities among the ““leftover” properties being offered by the pair of industry heavyweights.

Speaking to Mingtiandi, Wu said potential buyers might “need to cherry pick” from the sales list as “many of these buildings need to be redeveloped, meaning they won’t be able to make any profit right away”.

Among the 12 items worth a total of over HK$8 billion being sold by Tang and his family, some of the buildings were built decades ago, such as the 52-year-old Tai Chi Court on Austin Road in Kowloon’s Tsim Sha Tsui area.

Tang, who bought 81 percent ownership of the 5,457 square foot commercial-residential building back in 2016 for HK$450 million, has now put 85.42 percent ownership of the 11-storey building up for sale by tender.

“Buyers who eventually purchased the structure will inevitably need to put it on a compulsory sale, and that’s more time needed to be invested in the property,” Wu said.

Other properties Tang is making available via tender sale include the Woon Yin Building — a mixed-use asset  on Hennessy Road in Wanchai and 90 percent ownership of Delite Mansion on Tsim Sha Tsui’s Granville Circuit.

The investor known for his Causeway Bay shop holdings is also letting go of assets in Sham Shui Po, Sai Kung and Tsim Sha Tsui, and a pair of construction sites – one in Mong Kok and a second in Tuen Mun, as well as 50 percent ownership of the Ginza Plaza retail building on Mong Kok’s Sai Yeung Choi Street.