A property developer who has been doing projects in the low to middle income market for the past 15 years, is looking into Cebu for possible projects to invest into.
They are currently studying Cebu for a project that they plan to develop soon, said Guillermo C. Choa, Property Company of Friends Inc. or Pro-Friends chairman, who attended last week’s 23rd National Developers Convention at the Radisson Blu.
Choa said that before they develop projects in a specific area, they look for their market first and learn about their culture which is where they based their projects from.
“It’s like getting married, you cannot get married until you know your partner. We stay in a place and develop projects for a long time. We have ongoing projects that we will be developing for the next 20 years. That is why when we decide to come in we already know what project to offer,” he said.
Pro-Friends started in 1999 as a company that aims to minimize the housing gap especially in the low to middle income segment.
The company has already developed 17 projects with a land area inventory of about 1,800 hectares which is good for about 200,000 units.
Choa said, they have nine ongoing projects this year developments of which will run for the next 20 years.
Unlike other developers of low to mid-income projects, Pro-Friends focused on estate type of communities or what some also call “township” communities where you live, work, play, learn and worship.
“Our community like Lancaster New City in Cavite has a land area of 1,400 hectares and where we set up schools, a church, commercial establishments, offices and convenient transport system,” said Choa.
The company started to shift to township developments in 2004 with the 80-hectare Carmona Estates in Cavite as their first project with this concept.
In Cebu, Choa said 75 percent of land are in the mountain area and the rest or 25 percent are already built up.
“Culturally speaking, Cebu is a melting pot of cultures because you have migrants from other provinces around. We try to learn about the market, their lifestyle and their values and build something that will try to preserve that,” he said.
Choa said most of their projects are in Luzon and in the Visayas they have already started in Iloilo and soon in Cagayan de Oro.
Their Iloilo projects are Monticello Villas and Parc Regency Residences with 74 hectares in the municipality of Pavia.
Choa cited a study done by the University of Asia and the Pacific’s’ Winston Padojinog, which showed that there are 2.5 million families in the country today who can afford to buy a house but don’t have any homes.
“This is because most of the projects are targeted for the high-end market, leaving a huge backlog of housing for the low to middle income market.”
He also cited a study by Ateneo School of Business professor Eric Soriano, which predicted that by 2016, the housing backlog for the low to middle income market will reach 6.5 million.
“This is why we are catering to this market to help address this backlog. We make our processes very efficient to be able to deliver the best products at the price range of P800,000 to P3 million,” said Choa.