Double Dragon buys 70% of Visayas builder
Property developer Double Dragon Properties Corp. is expecting to surpass its P340-million profit target this year after taking control of a builder of affordable homes in Western Visayas, a stock exchange filing on Friday showed.
Double Dragon said it took a 70-percent stake in the Du family’s Zion Land for P140 million. Zion Land, which is debt-free, will serve as Double Dragon’s horizontal residential arm in the Visayas area for affordable housing developments.
“[Double Dragon] will bring into Zion Land more financial capability for expansion, further improve financial discipline and reinforce the team with stronger top management strategic support,” Double Dragon said.
“Zion Land is expected to continually grow and will start contributing to the revenues and net income of [Double Dragon] this year,” it added.
The company noted in the filing that Zion Land was projected to book P389 million in sales this year and a net income of P85.6 million.
Double Dragon said the current sales and marketing teams of Zion Land will be retained.
Double Dragon said in the filing it was scouting for other existing mid-sized housing developers with strong management and sales force teams in Mindanao, North Luzon and South Luzon.
The company would likewise continue to acquire properties in prime and strategic locations, it said.
The developer earlier disclosed that it acquired a 1.25-hectare property in Consolacion, Cebu, as part of plans to become a major developer of community malls in the country. Double Dragon said its subsidiary CityMall Commercial Centers Inc. acquired the land from Sta. Lucia Realty and Development Inc.
“The company intends to build another CityMall in this prime commercial property, which is targeted to start construction by July this year,” Double Dragon said in the filing. “The company targets to complete five CityMalls this year and will start laying the groundwork for the next 20 CityMalls to be opened by 2015.”
This is part of a plan to open 100 CityMall community malls by 2020 and hit P1 billion in net profit by 2016 and P4.8 billion by 2020.
CityMall Commercial Centers is 34-percent owned by Henry Sy’s SM Investments Corp. with the rest held by Double Dragon, which is controlled by Jollibee founder Tony Tan Caktiong and Mang Inasal founder Edgar J. Sia II.
