Saturday, May 17, 2008

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Battle of The Herd vs Developer

The following are some forum responses to a report in The Straits Times (16 May 2008) on a view expressesd by property tycoon Kwek Leng Beng on Singapore's real estate market.

Excerpt of Kwek Leng Beng's view:
Property tycoon Kwek Leng Beng has warned that most property investors follow the herd instinct and wait too long in a cautious market - then make a wrong move.

The executive chairman of City Developments (CDL) said he remains upbeat about prospects for the real estate scene in Singapore, despite recent weak sales volumes.

Mr Kwek, who was a panellist at the Financial Times Asia Property Summit held at his St Regis Hotel yesterday, said the property market is just consolidating.

The mood in the Singapore property market is cautious in the wake of the United States sub-prime crisis, with many buyers and sellers preferring to remain on the sidelines.

He said he was waiting for the opportunity to 'go in and buy at the right time, be a bottom fisher'.

But most people will do the opposite, he said. 'You notice (people) will keep on waiting ... until it's too late,' he said.

'It's the herd instinct ... the majority will be wrong.' A shrewd investor will act on his own, he said.

Response 1
I agree with Kwek Leng Beng: act on your own. So the more he asks you to buy, the more you shouldn't buy. Think for yourself: why he's making all these media appeals recently?

Response 2
He is desperate lah ... The herd instinct can make him rich, the herd instinct can also make him poor. So now he's trying to use the media to play on the "herd instinct".

Response 3
I call this the battle of the herd against the rich.

Response 4
Sorry I am not going to let the biggest conman take my money not even a cent . Let him suffer from last year's greed. Greed is the downfall of man. See how far Singapore prices can go up ? To $5000psf ?? You optimists are really dumb fools.

Market is going down a lot soon. No one is buying. Maybe the only buyers are KLB friends and families. No more speculators left. Please, if KLB still hoping for speculators to come in with the above pathetic article, he must be making a big mistake ! If he is not desperate, he wont post this article in Straits Times. Just leave us buyers alone. Enough of his brainwashing tactics.

Response 4
bears are worry, panic & tense now.
Kwek LB don't anyhow talk, money don't mean a lot to him now, reputation & respect worth more.

Believe wrong person, take the responsibility to accept the consequence, just like the koyok salesman here.
If govt want 3 parties to work closely, govt, businessman & workers, for the good of Spore, make sure they do the right thing, 1 mistake, they will have to pay heavily for it.

Response 5
If money dont mean anything to him, then why bother post article on Straits Times ? Just leave us alone to make our own decisions. Apparently, KLB is going to lose millions of dollars if property downturn lasts more than 2-3 years which is very likely. He has a huge landbank as well as units still not sold. And he is apparently getting very nervous now.

Everyone is certain price coming down. Even if next month, price were to go up a bit, it wont convince anyone that property market will be like last year again. No way ! No one now cares about property. People are dying all over the world by the thousands, and another calamity is about to happen, and u talking about property speculation. Just look at Classified Ads...sellers are bringing down their prices by 10-20% and yet still no takers. Except for a handful of prime units, I am also wondering who are these buyers ? Are they reliable sources or just made up by developers like a stage show.

Dude, you better spend your time more wisely ! Dont waste your time here convincing people cause no matter wat u do, we are not convinced.

Response 6
CDL chief Kwek Leng Beng awaiting right time to buy, mean he is not buying but selling. So do you want to buy now? The 'suckers' rally is over. We are now in the hot potatoes period.

Response 6
you can keep your money, nobody interested, can bring them to heaven or hell too.
CityDev Q1 result just out, profit up 30% to S$165M. Although transaction down in Q1, but they have many channel of incomes, without you buying, they still make big money from rental, hotel, services, maintenance.....
Why you worry their income for next 2-3 yrs, worry for yourself better, 1% FD in the bank keep till no value lah.
Sporean not interested, CityDev can just move all their money to help to develop other country, Taiwan, VIetnam, China, HK, Japan.....go oversea to help others better than these pathetic sporean, thought they are smart, just a bunch of cheapo.
Hope this can continue for next 20 yrs, then we see 20 yrs later, what is the difference between spore & regional countries.
All big developers should pour all the money to invest oversea since people here are not interested.

Response 7
Buy & hold for capital appreciation.
Sell to kiasi at 300% of today's price in 2015.

Response 8
well said, KLB.
We will support you all the way.

Response 9
He has said he is very confidence in Spore property in long run, so he will buy for capital appreciation, buy, rent & sell at a right time in future.
I think he will make a move before IR readiness, let wait for his push & drive in next round property buying spree.

Response 10
From wat i know KLB is a major property developer and not a property buyer. As such, he is pushing hard to sell all his condos to naive buyers whom he can con. He is still left with a few thousand units for sales.

If you want to continue to get conned by these billionaires who made money by cheating other people money, go ahead.

Cause property is definitely not a good buy now unless its 40% cheaper than current price. Cause Singapore has the lowest return on investment in the whole world, currently at only 3-4% of purchase price. Its not a good investment.

Response 11
Funny thing Mr Kwek said nothing in 2007 when the herd instinct was at its senseless bull run.

If he really believes that "'It's the herd instinct ... the majority will be wrong.' he said; Should Mr Kwek have stepped out then, on the ground of doing public justice, like he's doing now, to tell people not to buy property especially CDLs, because like he said, 'It's the herd instinct ... the majority will be wrong.'

Response 12
whatever happen to US today, US still a great country, who in the world have all the US brand, MS, Coca-cola, Apple, Boeing, Starbuck, Intel, IBM, Dell, Walmart, GE, Exxon, HPQ, Citi.....all the 6 biggest audit company, Morgan Stanley, Disney, Warner, Mcdonald......a whole long list...
You name it they have it & they are the creators of so many technology, internet, telco, semicon, car, theory, nuclear weapon......without them, you are just living in the 60s.
The spirit of in creativity, courage to think out of box, brave to do it, that is human, humanity, civilisation, culture.....
Do Spore have any big brand? product? SQ?....a lot is nothing, no patent, no new idea.....system, process.....can be copied easily.
what we lack of? courage, boldness, brave, balls....power to do thing.
Just kiasi, timid, no risk......

Response 12
Kiasi are not die-die must buy people .. what for buy when you'll only end up sponsoring foreigners to live in the properties .. better invest the money with better return, less risk and more liquid.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Just for everyone reference, if I remember correctly, back in the late 90's, right after the market collapse in 1997, the chairman of Far East Organisation tried to talk up the market by insisting that the worse was over for the property markets, citing a litany of factors. In the event, the markets continue to slide by another 30% to 40% over the next 5-6 years as many property developers went bust. The moral of the story? It ain't that easy to talk up the market, not even if you are a property bigshot. Singaporeans are not a bunch of poorly educated hillbillies.

Smart Buyer said...

Personally, I think Singaporeans are still rather gullible to market hypes. In fact, I'd attribute the sudden surge in property price in 2007 largely to such hypes like how the inflow of foreigners, the population growth target of 6.5 million, the 2 IRs, F1 blah.blah... would see property price soar to 10 times that of the 1996's peak . This sort of market hypes are still lingering in the heads of many dreamers. At the end of day, it's economic fundamentals that will determine what property price level is sustainable at a given time. We've to think harder and look deeper.

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Smart Buyer said...

Dear Hans,
In this post, I was quoting from a forum the different responses on the issue. If you see the comment you cited in the context of the nature of this blog, it's clear that I do not agree with the person concerned. I've published the comment unedited to illustrate how narrow-minded people can be to opposing views.

I've hidden your comment in order not to stir up any more of such negative emotion. It has never been my intention ever that this should happen. I apologise for the over-sight.

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