Grosvenor to spend 50b yen to buy, refurbish Tokyo apartments

[TOKYO] Grosvenor Ltd, the real estate firm owned by the family trust of the Duke of Westminster, plans to spend as much as 50 billion yen (S$614 million) to buy and refurbish apartments in Tokyo as demand for existing luxury homes increases.

Grosvenor will buy residential buildings, renovate and sell the units because it sees more demand from Asian and domestic high-net-worth individuals for top-end, refurbished apartments, said Koshiro Hiroi, managing director at Grosvenor. The sales volume of new apartments in Tokyo that cost more than 100 million yen surged as much as 20 per cent last year, while sales of existing apartments rose 5 per cent, added Hiroi, citing the company's research.

Grosvenor is betting on changing tastes among Japanese homebuyers. The number of people who prefer to buy and live in newly built apartments has remained above 96 per cent over the last decade, according to a report by Recruit Sumai Co, a Tokyo-based housing information provider. About 44 per cent of homebuyers surveyed said they prefer existing units, an increase from 33 per cent in 2003, the report revealed.