Singapore Apartment Complex Sells for $41M as Housing Market Surges

An apartment complex in Singapore’s posh River Valley area has sold for the full asking price weeks after going to market, as home sales in the city-state continue to surge.

River Valley Apartments on River Valley Road in District 10 sold for S$56 million ($41.2 million) through a collective sale by its owners, according to marketing agent Knight Frank, matching the tender’s guide price just over a month and a half after the sale effort began.

The 24-unit complex has already been granted outline planning permission for development of up to 34,741 square feet (3,228 square metres) of residential space on the building’s 12,407.6 square foot site, with Knight Frank pointing to the value of the location as helping to drive the sale, while also acknowledging a potential boost from recent government moves to encourage development of long-stay serviced apartments.

“Developers continue to be keen on prime and well located sites,” said Knight Frank Singapore chief executive Galven Tan. “The serviced apartment approval further enhanced the strong attributes of River Valley Apartments.”

Family Office Buy

The new owner of the freehold property is said to be a family office, with Knight Frank declining to comment on the buyer’s identity. News of the sale was first reported by the Business Times.

Earlier this month Singapore’s Urban Redevelopment Authority expanded the scope of redevelopment incentives encouraging builders to incorporate residential space in centre-city projects to included long-stay serviced apartments. The government has made development of an institutional rental housing industry a priority as it grapples with growing concerns regarding housing affordability.

The new owner is paying the equivalent of S$1612 per square foot of built area for River Valley Apartments, not including a nominal land betterment charge. Knight Frank estimates that at an average of 915 square feet per unit, the project would yield 37 homes.

Conversion to co-living or serviced residence use would require regulatory approval, according to the consultancy.

With street frontage on Jalan Mutiara, as well as on River Valley Road, River Valley Apartments is less than one kilometre (0.62 miles) from Great World MRT station and close to the River Valley and Alexandra primary schools as well as the Great World City commercial complex.

Market Surges

The rapid sale in River Valley comes as Singapore’s housing market has jumped into overdrive over the past five months, as buyers brush aside market cooling measures.

The 1,083 new private homes sold in the city-state during January were more than three and a half times the number sold a year earlier and more than five times the 203 homes sold in December, according to Urban Redevelopment Authority figures published this month.

The January total was only the second time that developers had sold a thousand homes or more in a single month since July 2023, according to local agency PropNex.

The beginning of the year jump came after home prices rose 2.3 percent in the fourth quarter, compared to a year earlier.