VistaLand first-half earnings drop

The Villar family’s Vista Land & Lifescapes Inc. sees a challenging period ahead as earnings took a hit during the first semester of the year.

The company, however, pointed to signs of recovery in the tail end of the first half as strict COVID-19 lockdown measures were eased in June.

Vista Land CEO Manuel Paolo Villar said the company would remain flexible as businesses confront a “new normal” amid the pandemic.

“We are continuously revisiting our planned project launches as well as the expansion program of our leasing business and are always making the necessary adjustments in our operations to better position the company once the economy recovers,” he said in a statement.

During the first semester, Vista Land saw its profit fall 39 percent to P3.5 billion while total revenue declined 22 percent to P18.3 billion.

“This pandemic has impacted our performance in the first half of the year, both on our leasing and residential businesses, and we still expect the rest of the year to be challenging,” chair Manuel Villar Jr. said in the same statement.

Among the country’s largest developers, Vista Land said it had spent about P9.4 billion in capital expenses from January to June this year.

To cope with the crisis, the company shifted to more digital marketing efforts given movement restrictions. This helped sales increase in June to about 70 percent of the pre-COVID level.

Some P1.8 billion in projects were launched during the first half of 2020. Paolo Villar said these were all located outside Mega Manila “to capitalize on the traction we have gained for our housing products in the provincial areas amid this pandemic.”—MIGUEL R. CAMUS