Twin Fountains EC launch at Woodlands

SINGAPORE - The first executive condominium (EC) of the year is being launched in Woodlands today.

Units at Twin Fountains are priced from $580,000 for a two-bedroom suite to $1.26 million for a four-bedroom dual-key unit, with prices ranging between $660 and $790 per sq ft (psf).

The project has 418 residential units across eight 14-storey blocks and is due for completion in October 2016, said its joint developers Frasers Centrepoint and Lum Chang in a statement on Tuesday.

They won the site for about $150 million, or about $302 psf per plot ratio (ppr) last October.

DWG senior manager Lee Sze Teck said he expected "very strong" demand for units at Twin Fountains, particularly its 104 dual-key units.

He pointed out that Twin Fountains and the upcoming Forestville would be the only EC projects this year to escape a ruling on the purchase of dual-key units that kicked in on Jan 12.

Sales of new dual-key EC units will be restricted to multi-generational families for the rest of the EC projects this year and onwards. Dual-key units have two entrances.

Frasers Centrepoint Homes chief executive Cheang Kok Kheong also cited pent-up demand for ECs in the area. No EC has been launched in Woodlands since La Casa in 2005.

Woodlands and the nearby towns of Choa Chu Kang and Yishun have around 609,100 residents combined, of whom four-fifths live in four- or five-room Housing Board flats. A majority of those people have also lived in their flats for the minimum occupation period of five years.

The next upcoming EC project is Forestville, also in Woodlands, which is expected to go back on the market before the end of June.

The 653-unit Forestville, developed by Hao Yuan Investment but managed by MCC Land, was first launched in December last year. But it later transpired that Hao Yuan had not been authorised by the Urban Redevelopment Authority to sell any of the units in the project.

Other EC developments expected to be launched later this year include an EC site in Sembawang won by boutique developer JBE Holdings in December last year for $211.9 million, or $323.76 psf ppr.

Twin Fountains is the second joint venture of Frasers Centrepoint and Lum Chang, after Esparina Residences in Buangkok, which was launched in October 2010 and is fully sold. Esparina Residences is expected to get its Temporary Occupation Permit in the first quarter of next year.

E-applications for units at Twin Fountains will be open from today to April 21. Successful applicants will be able to book the units on May 11.

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