‘Men of steel’
They create the perfect enclave.
Over the last decades, the country has seen its most trusted and esteemed developers working with a steel resolve to ensure that every deserving Filipino would realize his or her dream of owning a decent home.
Aware of the Filipinos’ determination to provide shelter for their loved ones and their families, these developers have sought to create communities and homes that serve not only as a safe sanctuary, but also a testament to one’s hard work and success.
But the work continues.
There seems to be no slowing down the country’s real estate players as demand for housing remains on the rise.
And by going beyond the basics and providing smart home choices in the market, these seasoned property developers have again proven why they are deserving of the accolades and respect thrown their way.
In today’s issue of the Inquirer, we pay tribute to some of them, whose relentless pursuit to create sanctuaries have allowed more hardworking Filipinos to live their dreams.
These are the developers who, for decades now, have been the country’s partner in nation building.
Big or small, there is no doubt that the proponents and leaders behind these firms have achieved quite a feat, and there is no doubt as well that they are bound to achieve more.
Elevating lifestyles
It is a very exciting time for Torre Lorenzo Development Corp. as market sentiment remains upbeat.
Across the different sectors, you can feel the energy and excitement for what is yet to come. Lifestyles are changing for the better, even outside Metro Manila.
Central to our business is a passion to elevate the lifestyles of Filipino communities all over the archipelago. You will find this vision across our entire real estate portfolio.
Almost a quarter of a century ago, I looked at what limited housing was available for university students and decided that we could offer a better option. Today, we are on our seventh Premium University Residence which offers upscale quality and security for university students.
These projects are all within walking distance of top universities.
We currently have projects within the vicinity of De La Salle University Taft, DLS-College of Saint Benilde, University of the Philippines Manila School of Medicine; University of Santo Tomas, University of Perpetual Help Alabang, and Ateneo de Manila University.
Ten years ago, we recognized favorable conditions for investment in Davao City as seen in the steady economic, industrial and tourism growth and consequent rise in demand for higher standards of living.
As our contribution to the growth of Southern Mindanao, we are developing Davao’s first luxury complex, which includes The Dusit Thani Residence Davao and The dusitD2 Hotel Davao. The Dusit Thani Residences Davao will be the first Dusit Thani Residence in Southeast Asia.
This upmarket complex is in partnership with Dusit International and will be completed in 2018 and fully operational by 2019. The Dusit Davao complex will redefine the luxury living and upscale hotel accommodation in Southern Mindanao.
More recently, TLDC has invested in emerging urban centers outside Metro Manila, under the Tierra Lorenzo mixed-use lifestyle concept.
These Tierra Lorenzo developments offer residential, retail, hotel and sports-club facilities that promise to set new standards of living. These include Tierra Lorenzo Lipa located in Lipa City, Batangas and Tierra Lorenzo San Fernando, located in San Fernando, Pampanga.
With every property we build, we offer two things: an elevated customer experience, and the opportunity for longer-term value for our investors.
TOMAS P. LORENZO
CEO
Torre Lorenzo
Development Corp.
Providing versatile solutions
The real estate industry remains robust and there seems to be no signs of slowing down.
With millions of Filipinos still working on realizing their dream of owning a decent home, developers are on their toes to ensure that there’s enough supply to fill the gap. And such belief is shared by trusted property developer DMCI Homes which, for years now, have been providing hardworking Filipinos quality homes.
“The mid-income market remains to be vibrant and thriving. In fact, we are pleasantly surprised about our own performance this year. We can attribute this to the growth of the middle-income class, both in number and purchasing power,” said DMCI Homes president Alfredo R. Austria.
“Residential condominiums are seen as versatile solutions to urban living challenges, and it is interesting to note how condo units are utilized as primary homes, halfway homes, or even investment vehicles,” he added.
Over the years, DMCI Homes has seen a number of developers who tried to earnestly meet the demand of the market.
Such scenario has proven to be advantageous to homebuyers as they’re not only given a number of choices, but also afforded the privilege to carefully select a development that would fit both their lifestyle and budget.
“Competition is still tough as developers try to offer the best possible products to an increasingly value conscious market. This scenario ultimately benefits the home buyer,” Austria shared. “Another interesting phenomenon to observe is the attitude of millennials towards housing. With a more mobile and experience-oriented lifestyle, condo units, whether rented or owned, seem to be a good fit for them.”
Currently, DMCI Homes has been working doubly hard to ensure that such needs of the market, including the millennials, are not only carefully met but also exceeded.
The company also believes that to remain relevant in an increasingly competitive sector, one must deliver the right product and have the best offering.
“We just try our best every day to stay true to our mission of providing the best possible housing for the middle-income class, especially young families. The demand is there since a significant number of new middle-income households are created every year. It is now a matter of addressing that demand by designing and building homes that best fit their lifestyle and budget,” he further explained.
DMCI Homes is known for delivering quality projects, whose values have been proven to increase over time. It has become one of the market’s preferred choices given its untarnished reputation and strong background in construction.
It has also introduced a number of innovations that made its developments an even better choice for discerning buyers.
“We are continuously looking for ways to improve the aesthetics, quality and cost-efficiency of our current product formats. In fact, our research and development group has a target of 3,000 innovations a year. Innovations come in various forms. Some are considered major and visible, such as the implementation of two elevator cores in high-rises, while some are actually not visible to the customer, but serve to make buildings function better. We usually announce innovations during our project launches,” Austria claimed.
“Also, we are currently studying new product formats and we want to make sure that whatever we launch will at least be better than what is currently out there in the market. Service-wise, we hope to enhance the quality of our services by harnessing IT capabilities, automating and digitizing aspects of our business processes, where possible,” he concluded.
Closing the gap
The Philippine affordable housing sector presents a lot of opportunities for housing developers.
A massive backlog exists in the country of approximately 5.7 million households.
Areas such as Metro Manila thus remain attractive for real estate companies, as challenges faced by the population from the lack of mass transit makes living in the city more appealing.
Yet, despite the influx of new developments, the gap is still expected to widen especially within the affordable housing sector. The rising demand for housing within the metro has made it even less affordable for most of our hardworking fellow Filipinos.
Thus, potential buyers, find that there is a mismatch between the housing costs and their capacity to pay.
8990 Holdings Inc. remains committed in narrowing the gap through the production of economic and socialized housing units with prices that range from P450,000 to P2 million.
8990 Holdings Inc. remains committed in narrowing the gap through the production of socialized housing units.
The company’s overall business strategy, and the key to its current and past success in the affordable housing industry, is to deliver the right products with speed and quality to its target customers composed mainly of low to middle income earners who mostly cannot afford to pay rent and monthly amortization at the same time.
For the past 13 years, the company has been the pioneer in the affordable housing industry especially in key areas across the country. It brings this same pioneering effort to Metro Manila as 8990 makes city living affordable to ordinary hard-working Filipinos who cannot afford to purchase homes above P2 million.
8990’s main goal is to bring affordable housing closer to low to middle income Filipinos in Metro Manila. Given its in-depth knowledge of the needs, preference and constraints of its customer base its current projects reflect a specific need.
8990 introduced its first halfway home concept through Urban Deca Tower Edsa as a solution for workers who live outside the metro. Each unit provides a respite for workers who travel more than two hours to get to the office by providing 13 sqm units that are fully equipped with beds, air conditioners, TV and microwave ovens.
Owning one of these units allows buyers to save on the cost of transportation and at the same time own an asset that would appreciate in the future. Sales take up for this project was faster than expected and is already fully sold. This project is expected to be replicated in major thoroughfares.
For housing needs of larger families who want to reside within Metro Manila, the company looks at densely populated areas where it can introduce larger units. Its largest project to date is Urban Deca Homes Manila.
This 13 building development is located in a 8.4 hectare property in Tondo, Manila and will provide 13,000 units with sizes that range from 22.95 sqm to 32.17 sqm units for the same price of homes outside of Metro Manila.
This bodes well for buyers with growing families. The project will also feature a mall that would serve as an amenities area for its residents.
—Willy Uy
COO
8990 Holdings Inc.
Happier Beginnings
What is the commitment and pledge of Suntrust Properties Inc. to the Philippine real estate industry, and most importantly to its buyers? How else can Suntrust help uplift the lives of hardworking Filipinos?
The Philippines’ 5 million housing backlog presents another good opportunity for Suntrust to be a major contributor to the nation’s economic growth and development. As the Megaworld arm that caters to the affordable market, we are at an advantageous position to answer this need.
For two decades now, Suntrust has been building homes and communities that are geared towards the low- to mid-cost housing requirements. And we don’t just build structures or buildings.
We always envision a complete township for the residents of all our projects. We always aim at creating master-planned and self-sustaining communities so that our homeowners don’t even have to travel far to have all they need—from schools and commercial establishments to resort-type amenities all within their Suntrust community.
As part of our commitment to continue to deliver affordable, quality townships, we have also started developments in the regional areas, namely Baguio, Davao, Tagum and Bacolod, and very soon in Bicol.
We hope that this will start a trend of “reverse migration” wherein locals will decide to come back and live or invest in their own provinces.
We cannot stress enough the importance of our own company culture in defining how we do things here in Suntrust. We operate on the core values of teamwork, professionalism and corporate social responsibility. But even more important than that, we do our best to instill the culture of “malasakit” among our members.
It’s not just the concern for one another here in Suntrust among officers and employees, but more so for our internal and external clients, and even those who are not organic members of our organization.
Just recently we celebrated our 20th year under the banner theme #BenTengkyu.
It was our way of showing our gratitude and giving back to the community especially those who are not our employees but have helped shape Suntrust to what it is today.
They are our construction site workers who toil day in, day out at our project sites to complete our houses and our buildings. And through our 20th anniversary campaign, we tried to make them realize that they are not just working on structures but that they are building dream homes.
They are our partners in turning our homeowners’ dreams into realities. We uplifted them and showed them that what they do everyday is all part of a bigger scheme of things.
By doing so (uplifting our construction workers), we are also able to improve the quality of our deliverables to our homebuyers, which in turn can also help uplift their quality of living. And so it’s really a domino effect in a very positive way. And because it all comes from a culture that is already inherent to Suntrust, it just comes out naturally.
We always do our best to give genuine excellent service to all our clients and partners, both internal and external.
—Harry Paltongan
President
Suntrust Properties
Joining the big league
Charles E. Buban, @BonicsLair
Ever since PA Properties began building communities in 1993, the Laguna-based developer made it a point to design more functional yet beautiful houses that could be had at affordable rates and payment schemes.
While the company has become a major player in the provinces of Laguna and Cavite, PA Properties has also established its presence in Metro Manila and in Batangas, Bulacan and Pampanga.
“It’s obvious that the Philippines is suffering from woefully inadequate undersupply of housing—currently estimated at around 5.7 million housing units—so as a developer we had to increase our efforts to deliver more communities that promote opportunities for personal growth and economic independence,” explained PA Properties chair Romarico “Bing” Alvarez.
Alvarez said that each of the houses the company turned over means their new owners will no longer have to rent or be forced to live in squalid conditions.
“Building houses within the price range that are very attractive to the middle income earners may be a labor-intensive investment. But on the other hand, we are creating more jobs—a spurt in activity in this housing price range unleashes a chain reaction in other allied industries, creating a multiplier effect that impacts the economy,” Alvarez explained.
He said that developers like PA Properties would do well in investing more in middle-cost housing because a recent report cites that “the middle-income earners are set to become a prominent consumer force thanks not only to their large size, but also their strong income growth prospects.”
Euromonitor International, one of the leading independent providers of strategic market research has identified the Philippines (together with China, India, Indonesia and Nigeria), as an emerging market with the best middle-class potential.
“The middle-income earners are expected to play a key role in boosting economic growth through higher consumption, which includes buying a house,” Alvarez further said.
