Philrealty stays in court-assisted rehab, to settle all obligations in 2013

MANILA, Philippines—Philippine Realty and Holdings Corp. (Philrealty) is not exiting court-assisted corporate rehabilitation anytime soon but the property developer expects to settle all remaining obligations within 2013.

Philrealty disclosed late Monday that the Quezon City Regional Trial Court branch 93 had denied its motion to terminate the rehabilitation proceedings. The court ruling, as quoted by Philrealty, said the company still had “substantial” amount to pay in accordance with court-approved rehabilitation plan and the termination should thus be “deferred” until the full settlement of its obligations.

In an interview, Philrealty president Amador Bacani explained that the remaining receivables referred to by the court amounted to over P100 million and should thus be settled by 2013, in line with the timetable mentioned during the company’s recent stockholders meeting on the end of rehabilitation proceedings.

Bacani said that notwithstanding this ruling, Philrealty would terminate court-assisted rehabilitation by 2013 with the settlement of its remaining obligations by then.  He said this ruling only deferred the exit pending the settlement of those residual obligations.

“What we’ll do is to submit a payment schedule which the receiver will evaluate,” Bacani said.

“I think one year should be sufficient (to complete everything) because the amount involved is not as big compared to that when we went to rehab,” Bacani said.

When Philrealty underwent court-assisted rehabilitation in early 2000s, Bacani said outstanding bank loans excluding accrued interest amounted to P2 billion. Including interest, this reached as much as P3 billion.

The remaining over P100 million liabilities, Bacani said, had arisen from cases that Philrealty had lost in court.

During its recent stockholders’ meeting, Philrealty unveiled plans to pursue more property projects such as a prime mixed-use development in Bonifacio Global City. For instance, it expects to sign within this year a memorandum of understanding with its principal stockholder Greenhills Properties Inc. to develop the latter’s 6,400-square-meter lot fronting BGC’s 5th Avenue.

After completing the first building Skyline Tower in Andrea North, which is now 35-percent occupied, Philrealty also plans to bring to the property market early next year the second tower, Sky Breeze, which will offer 278 units in 31 floors and targeted for delivery to buyers by mid-2015.  Sales value of all units in this second building is estimated at over P2 billion.

Philrealty also expects to unlock values out of a townhouse subdivision project in San Fernando, La Union. The company plans to sell 236 units with a total sales value of P600 million to P700 million from this townhouse project.