|
By Likha C. Cuevas-Miel Reporter
WITH the US slowdown, the
Philippines’ biggest real estate developer said it is shifting its
focus to the middle-income segment while strengthening its marketing
efforts in the Middle East and Europe.
In a briefing on Wednesday, Rex
Mendoza, Ayala Land Inc. (ALI) senior vice-president, said
residential sales of Ayala Land Premiere (ALP) , the group’s
high-end development unit, “slowed down” leading to flat growth
in the first two months this year.
ALP is marketed largely to
overseas Filipinos living in the US, with 60 percent of its sales
from this market. ALI said it has yet to see a spike in
cancellations, which usually stands at 10 percent.
Since ALI saw a “tapering
off” in sales abroad, the company is widening its geographical
scope, including the Middle East and Europe in its marketing
campaign. The company also shifted its thrust as it offers more
Avida and Community Innovations Inc. (CII) developments, its
mid-income offerings, to US-based Filipinos.
In the first two months of this
year, ALI booked a 39-percent increase in sales take up
year-on-year, Bernard Vincent Dy, the company’s head of
international sales, said.
The property firm is also
expanding its other businesses, especially hotels. According to
Marivic Añonuevo, senior vice-president for corporate division, the
company’s hotels such as Hotel Intercontinental Manila
traditionally serve the corporate business traveler market, which is
suffering from “tight supply.” ALI, in partnership with Kingdom
Hotel Investments, will build two hotels at the Ayala Center. In
addition, ALI also sold a parcel of land to the Shangri-La group,
which will build a hotel at the Bonifacio Global City.
The company said it is
“reviewing” the opportunities presented by the growing tourism
market and is “studying closely” what kind of hotels it would
build in its projects in the south. Among its ventures south of
Manila is Nuvali, the company’s largest development to date in
Canlubang, Laguna.
ALI is earmarking P24.3 billion
in capital expenditures, P10 billion of which would be borrowed
while the rest would come from internally generated funds.
|
