Property Investment & Management
Property Investment and Management In Japan
Leveraging on the experience of property investment management in Japan through Capital Advisers, our associate company, we have been providing property investment opportunities in Japan. Capital Advisers focuses on managing investments in niche segments of the Japanese property market, namely boutique business hotels and stylish studio residential apartments.
These property assets in Japan are acquired using mostly externally raised funds. Capital Advisers then plays a developer role in planning, designing and developing the assets, after which, it plays the role of operator (in the case of the boutique business hotels) and manager of the completed assets. These different roles generate a series of recurring income streams from the property assets under management.
The uniqueness of our residential property business model is that we are involved in our property assets development from the initial stage (where we are intimately involved in the design and layout planning of our property projects) to post completion whereby our properties are fitted and furnished and operated under a consolidated brand image. With this brand image, we provide stylish studio apartments in Tokyo and other metropolitan areas. Almost all apartments are within walking distance from railway stations. The target market segment is single working men and women who care more about their lifestyle i.e. location, design and atmosphere of interior and exterior. They are well located and enjoy high tenancy occupancies.
"VISTA Hotel" series is our core hotel brand which focuses on boutique business hotels. Capital Advisers is also involved in providing hotel management services to our own hotels and those that are owned by third parties. The target market segment is business travellers and tourists who require quality hotel accommodation at reasonable rate. Our hotels are also located at convenient places and we provide better service at an affordable price.
In 2009, we have obtained two office building asset management deals. Office property in japan is a new type of asset managment portfolio for us.
As we have identified Capital Advisers as a key strategic asset, we increased our shareholding in Capital Advisers to 92.7%, which was completed on 4 January 2008, making it a subsidiary of the Group. Subsequently, we increased our shareholding in Capital Advisers to 96.9% in April 2010.
Property Investment In China
In the PRC, we continue to see strong growth opportunities in the property investment business. With that outlook in mind, we have been shifting from our previously distressed assets investment business to the property investment business by leveraging on our wide business network there. In January 2007, we established Uni-Asia Guangzhou, a whollyowned property investment company to explore property investment in PRC. We intend to tap on the experience and core competencies of Capital Advisers to explore sustainable investment opportunities in the PRC property market. To date, Uni-Asia Guangzhou has acquired 14 office units in Guangzhou, all of which are leased out as at end of Dec. 2009.