We just received news that The LINE Sathorn by Sansiri is cancelled. We were informed of this by a Sansiri staff member and we are in the midst of contacting all our clients who had purchased The LINE Sathorn from us back in 2017. We were told that Sansiri would refund the monies paid with interest or buyers could purchase another project with an attractive discount.
The LINE Sathorn was a very popular project as it is located right next to Surasak BTS Station, right in the heart of the Sathorn financial district. The LINE Sathorn was supposed to be located right next to The Diplomat Sathorn. This was one of the developments which we were looking forward to completing and we are a tad disappointed that it may not be completed.
Here is a construction update which we did back in December 2018.
We are still receiving details of the compensation offer from Sansiri. To all those who had purchased through us, we will be contacting you and we will assist you to get this resolved. We do not have firm details but we thought that it would be a responsible thing for us to put this out so that you would hear it from us before reading it from some other source. Let us get back to everyone once things have become clearer.
Many clients have been asking us about The Third Place. Many have been hearing about it and reading about it in the Bangkok media but few truly understand the actual concept or even know what it is.
Well for starters, it is actually called 101 The Third Place and it is developed by Magnolia Quality Development Corporation Limited (MQDC), which is one of Bangkok’s largest developers. It all stems from the True Digital Park project and 101 The Third Place is part of it. Quoting Ms Srisanguansakul, SVP of Commercial and Retail at MQDC, “101 The Third Place is a lifestyle complex within Bangkok’s integrated True Digital Park Complex”.
Major companies have already set up their offices in True Digital Park. For starters, Google Academy, Huawei, WeWork and Ricoh have moved into True Digital Park. More will follow suit as the park takes shape. It was only recently opened at the end of 2018 but much of it is already in operation.
If you would like to read up about related news about True Digital Park, you can refer to these articles:
If you have been following our articles and YouTube channel, we have been advocating that the end line for property investment should be at perhaps On Nut BTS Station. This being Punnawithi and beyond On Nut, is an exception. We really do think that if buyers were looking at this area, they should only consider the three condominiums that are part of True Digital Park. For starters, there is a covered walkway to Punnawithi BTS Station and residents of the three condominiums have complimentary access to the co-working space in The Third Place. The condominiums are barely 10 to 20 metres away from The Third Place and the offices in True Digital Park. The whole Digital Park is developed by MQDC which also develops the condominiums and if investors would like to take advantage of these then they should buy into the ecosystem.
We have been asked on countless occasions about a particular project called Aspire Asoke Ratchada. We have always made it a point to visit the actual site and show flat of the various projects before recommending them to our clients. This particular project, Aspire Asoke Ratchada, is being marketed very aggressively by the various marketing agencies around the world. We would like to highlight a few things to potential buyers.
The location is not at the site of the sales gallery. The sales gallery is opposite the Unilever headquarters which is close to Phra Ram 9 or Rama 9 MRT Station. Instead, the actual location of the project is within a small narrow alley. According to Google Maps, the walk will take at least 24 minutes and will cover about 1.9 kilometres to get to Phra Ram 9 MRT Station.
The walk from Phra Ram 9 MRT Station to Aspire Asoke Ratchada
The area is in a very small and narrow soi. If you were to attempt to view it via street view, you will not be able to see the site. The lane is narrow and can perhaps only accommodate one vehicle at any given moment.
The small alley leading to the project
The once herald Super Tower is not going to happen. The past few years have been all about many agencies selling the idea of a Super Tower being built at Rama 9. The truth is that after a feasibility study was done, the tower was deemed to be unprofitable and thus it was scrapped. In its place, an integrated hotel and office buildings should be built although plans have yet to be finalised.
The project is not near Asoke BTS Station which is next to Terminal 21 on the BTS line. It is also not along Asoke or Ratchada.
The project may seem cheap as compared to other projects in the Rama 9 area but we would urge buyers to think whether there will be demand for that particular area. We should not think of prices as cheap but instead, focus on prices that are fair.
We would think that there would be more potential one stop north from Phra Ram 9 BTS Station. Thailand Cultural Centre MRT Station is going to be the intersection of two MRT lines, the existing Blue MRT Line and the upcoming Orange MRT Line. Furthermore, the Chinese embassy is located close to Thailand Cultural Centre MRT Station as well as the AIA Tower and the Stock Exchange of Thailand. If you would like to learn about up and coming locations in Bangkok, you can take a look at this article: https://www.daryllum.com/where-are-the-up-and-coming-property-investment-locations-in-bangkok/
We urge buyers to do their own due diligence. Making a trip down to see a property should be the least that you can do. If not, do take a look at any videos online about the location and do ask the agent that is marketing the property to you to show you a video of the walk to the nearest train station. This should not be for Aspire Asoke Ratchada alone but for all properties.
Yours Sincerely,
The Invest Bangkok Property editorial team
P.S. we have a video of the drive to the actual site.
Since the implementation of the Bank of Thailand’s stricter mortgage requirements, the number of speculators has decreased. In the long run, we do feel that this is positive for the health of the Thai property market. There were instances whereby local Thais were holding on to multiple properties just because mortgage requirements were extremely lax. With fewer speculators, the threat of a huge bubble forming has decreased although we will only know the true effect of the stricter mortgage requirements perhaps a couple of months later.
The residential property demand should be driven by two types of buyers:
The residential end-user buyers
The long term investor
Those looking for a huge turnaround in profit should not be in Thailand and mainly Bangkok property market. The times where you could “flip” an option has disappeared as prices are not going to increase so dramatically as before.
In turn, the number of new project launches in Bangkok is going to be significantly reduced as developers focus on clearing their excess stock, completing construction of buildings and transferring titles to buyers.
Buy-to-rent investors should take a more selective stance when it comes to selecting a unit because the number of expatriates did not increase nor did their rental budgets. Buyers should focus on properties in central Bangkok, located within the Central Business Districts (CBD) and within close proximity to the train station. They should also look for condominiums with a good mix of facilities that will attract expatriate tenants. This will be a good year for property buyers as price growth moderates and buyers will have time to understand the development and the area before committing to a property.
There are instances whereby our clients have asked us to assist them in their purchase of a retail property. We have always maintained that the retail sector is facing two main threats.
Competition from e-commerce
Competition from upcoming supply
“All over the world, e-commerce is challenging traditional retail stores, and Thailand is no exception,” said CBRE in a report. E-commerce has yet to take off in a huge way in Thailand but that will change eventually. Currently, retail tenants all over the world are adopting e-commerce into their business to complement their brick and mortar retails stores. In most instances, they do reduce their number of retail stores. This is an ever growing trend and is not unique just to Thailand but across the world.
Retail supply is also increasing and these new retail spaces will pose a challenge to the current ones on the market. Here is a chart by CBRE Research showing the retail supply in Bangkok by area.
We still find that the retail segment poses a lot of uncertainty. The challenge coming from e-commerce is huge and will change the way business is done. This is one of the reasons why we do not take on too many retail projects under our company and brand.
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