KUALA LUMPUR - YTL Corp, Malaysia's biggest builder, won a bid to buy Westwood Apartments in downtown Singapore at a record price, increasing its investment in the island-nation as home prices surged to a 10-year high.

It has won a tender to buy 50 high-end apartments on Orchard Boulevard for S$435 million in cash, YTL Corp said in a statement on Tuesday.

The purchase is the company's third land acquisition in Singapore in the last two years, it added.

'The proposed acquisition will enable the group to enhance its earnings potential from the high sale and rental rates expected from the renewed interest in the property sector in Singapore,' YTL said in the statement.

The longest economic expansion in more than a decade in Singapore has pushed up home prices and prompted developers to buy and develop existing apartments at a record pace.

The sale price works out to about S$2,498.55 a square foot, based on the space YTL can build on the site, Bloomberg calculations show. That beat the previous record, set in June when SC Global Developments Ltd paid S$2,338 a square foot for the Ardmore, also located near the city's main shopping belt.

YTL and partner LP World Sdn. in March won a bid to buy a site on Singapore's Sentosa island for S$90 million to build a residential property development.

Westwood Apartments, which is more than 30 years old, is a condominium development located on approximately 62,179 square feet of freehold residential land, YTL said. The site can be redeveloped into about 43 units of 4,000-square- foot luxury condominium apartments, it added. -- AGENCIES