SC Global launches high-end apartment at The Marq

SINGAPORE: Luxury property developer SC Global Developments has launched a high-end apartment at The Marq on

Paterson Road.

The unit, decorated by French luxury goods designer Hermes, promises to bring a new meaning to luxury living.

This, as buying of luxury properties typically located in city and fringes has picked up.

The project will be the world's first apartment entirely decorated by Hermes but SC Global said the 6,200 square

feet apartment at its flagship development The Marq is not for sale.

The unit, which will be used only as a private hospitality apartment for private functions, symbolises the peak of

luxury living.

About half of the 66 freehold units situated in two 24-storey towers at The Marq put up for sale have been taken up

since its launch in the second quarter of 2007.

It added four out of 10 buyers are foreigners.

SC Global CEO Simon Cheong said: "For high-end apartments, it's for the discerning few. We don't have many

apartments. We just completed the project and we don't really have a launching programme. It's only by appointment

only, as far as SC Global is concerned. The luxury market is a very different market altogether."

Sale of luxury properties in the city area, which has softened in recent months, showed a pick-up last month.

In April, the number of new homes sold by developers in the city doubled from the figures in March. But analysts are

mixed on the buying trend of these more expensive apartments for the remaining 2012.

Nicholas Mak, head of research at SLP International, said: "Because of the government measures like additional

buyer's stamp duty, where there is additional stamp duty for foreign purchases… the core central region where there

is high foreign participation is going to remain fairly low for the next half a year or so."

Analysts said the narrowing price gap between luxury and mass market properties in recent months prompts some to

take a second look at properties in the city and fringes.

Chua Yang Liang, head of research (Southeast Asia) at Jones Lang LaSalle, said: "There is this motivation for

Singaporean buyers to go into the market primarily because of the price gap. The gap of pricing between the high end

market and the mass market has narrowed, compared to the historical high when the series started in 2007. The gap of

the two markets then was about 2.5 times in favour of the high-end market. Right now, we are looking at about 1.4,

1.5 times only."

According to URA Price Index, prices of non-landed properties in the central region and city fringes fell 0.6 per

cent in the first quarter while prices for private residential properties in the suburbs increased by 1.1 per cent.