Two GLS housing sites at Canberra Drive put up for tender

The adjacent parcels could yield about 675 units.

The Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) has put two residential sites at Canberra Drive for sale by public tender under the Government Land Sales (GLS) programme, according to a media release.

Parcel A has an area of 13,315.3 sqm, a maximum gross floor area (GFA) of 18,642 and can yield about 220 housing units. Parcel B is 27,566.1 sqm wide with a maximum GFA of 38,593 sqm, and can offer about 455 units. The two adjacent land parcels could yield about 675 units in total.

According to Tricia Song, Colliers International head of research for Singapore, Parcel A may attract 4-6 bids from smaller developers with its more regular shape and closeness to the recently-opened Canberra MRT station. In contrast, Parcel B may attract a slightly fewer 3-5 bids, but likely from medium-sized to larger developers with its larger size.

“While Parcel B is larger and odd-shaped, with an elongated thin tail, the developer can build single loading units which offer unblocked views over the low-rise landed housing. A larger site also has potentially better economies of scale and can offer more facilities,” she said.

Song projects their top bids at $135m for Parcel A and $280m for Parcel B.

The tender for the two sites will close on 3 March 2020, which will be batched with an executive condominium site at Fernvale Lane to be put for sale in December under the programme.

“Splitting the large plot into two smaller sites would make them more palatable and attractive to a wider range of developers. However, it would be interesting to see how the two tenders pan out seeing that both sites are launched for sale at the same time,” Song commented, noting if developers could likely bid for both parcels to better defend prices.