SingHaiyi eyeing more distressed US property

HONG KONG-listed Heng Fai Enterprises may have guided SingHaiyi, previously a struggling interior fit-out firm, into Singapore's property development scene in 2006 and helped its market cap to grow hundred-fold to about $400 million in the immediate years that followed, but Heng Fai's exit last year also left it in the lurch, saddled with a portfolio of residential projects amid government measures to quell property speculation.

Although three of its four projects have sold well, sales at one - the 56-unit freehold CosmoLoft in Balestier - have been slow with only 10 per cent sold. This led SingHaiyi to record an impairment of $10.5 million for FY2014 after the company compared its sales and selling prices to other projects in the vicinity.

In a recent interview, SingHaiyi's management told The Business Times that more than just diversifying out of residential projects into the more resilient commercial space - evident from its taking of a 20 per cent stake in TripleOne Somerset earlier this year - the Catalist-quoted real estate firm is increasingly focusing on purchasing distressed properties in the US.