Boustead Projects Buys 28 and 30 Bideford Road For S$515mil

SINGAPORE – A unit of Boustead Projects has purchased 28 and 30 Bideford Road, a mixed-use commercial property, from SC Aetas Holdings for S$515 million, excluding goods and services tax (GST), reported The Edge on Friday afternoon (24 June, SGT).

Designed by Japanese architectural firm Nikken Sekkei, the 18-storey, high-end project consists of healthcare, hospitality, and commercial components. It is also poised to obtain the Green Mark Platinum certification from Singapore’s Building and Construction Authority (BCA).

The commercial development stands on a land plot measuring roughly 2,006.9 sq m and it has a gross floor area (GFA) of 14,637.9 sq m. It also received its Temporary Occupation Permit on 10 January 2020.

Bideford House, a 50-percent-owned subsidiary of Boustead Projects, has bought the commercial property after a share charge was enforced from September 2021 due to S$110 million in notes that came due in 2020. The notes were bought by a Boustead Projects-led consortium in August 2021, and were collagenized by a charge on the stocks held by the property’s owner SC Aetas Holdings. Subsequently, SC Aetas was placed under voluntary liquidation by creditors, and the commercial development was put up for sale as part of the winding-up process.

According to SC Aetas’ audited financial statements as of end-2020, the commercial property had a carrying value of S$605.4 million. In December 2021, The Business Times also reported that the asset had been put up for sale with a guide price of S$600 million. But based on the latest valuation conducted by Savills Valuation and Professional Services on 20 June 2022, the asset carries a market value of S$550 million.

BP-Real Estate Investment, a wholly-owned unit of Boustead Projects, owns a 50 percent stake in Bideford House, while Roark Capital and Lim Cher Meng Realty each hold a quarter-stake. The stockholders are unrelated to one another, and the last two mentioned entities are investment holding companies owned by private investors.

Boustead Projects, which plans to satisfy BP-Real Estate’s part of the consideration via cash funded by internal resources, shared that the purchase of 28 and 30 Bideford Road will allow it to “expand and diversify its property portfolio, as well as increase its income streams through the ownership and management of the property”.