Wing Tai, Metro outbid 5 others for Dunearn Road site with bullish S$1,625 psf ppr bid

[SINGAPORE] The second Bukit Timah Turf City site to be released by the government drew heated competition from developers on Tuesday (Apr 28), with Wing Tai and Metro’s Metrobilt Construction coming out on top with a bid of S$1,624.89 per square foot per plot ratio (psf ppr). 

The top bid of just under S$533 million for the prime Dunearn Road land was 3 per cent higher than the next-highest bid of S$517 million or S$1,576.13 psf ppr from a Frasers Property-led consortium, which had clinched the first Dunearn site tendered in June 2025 at S$1,410 psf ppr. 

At about S$1,625 psf ppr, Wing Tai and Metro’s bid was 15.3 per cent higher than the price of the first site – a premium which “may indicate strong confidence in the future housing estate here”, noted Justin Quek, deputy group chief executive officer of Realion (OrangeTee & ETC) Group.

Besides Frasers Property, the latest tender also saw the return of several other developers who had missed out on the earlier Dunearn site.

These included China Overseas Land & Investment with a bid of S$501.9 million or S$1,530.09 psf ppr; City Developments Ltd not far behind with S$501.4 million or S$1,528.44 psf ppr; and UOL, Singapore Land and Kheng Leong with S$500.6 million or S$1,526.28 psf ppr.

The lowest bid, at S$485.5 million or S$1,480.01 psf ppr, was from Hong Leong and GuocoLand.

The tender bids were at the higher end of estimates by analysts polled by The Business Times earlier this week, who had expected the top offers to come in between S$1,350 and S$1,650 psf ppr.

Consultants had anticipated fairly strong participation for the Dunearn Road plot after the adjacent site garnered nine bids in June 2025, in the first land tender for the new Bukit Timah Turf City estate, slated to yield roughly 15,000 to 20,000 new public and private homes.

Nearby, a Holland Link site attracted five bids when the tender closed in July 2025, with the highest offer of S$1,432 psf ppr coming from Sim Lian Group. 

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The Dunearn Road government land sales plot on offer was expected to draw equally firm demand, given its location in prime District 10 and improving market for new homes in the Core Central Region (CCR).

Observers also cited the plot’s “palatable” size of 19,041.6 square metres (sq m), which can generate around 330 units.

PropNex head of research and content Wong Siew Ying noted that developers sold 1,916 new private homes in the CCR in 2025, the highest in four years. CCR projects launched this year, including Newport Residences and River Modern, have also recorded fairly healthy sales. 

The “robust take-up” and “benchmark pricing” at some of these recent launches have supported developers’ appetite for new land, even amid ongoing economic and geopolitical uncertainty, said Tricia Song, CBRE research head for Singapore and South-east Asia. 

In the near term, new CCR supply is expected to fall back. Huttons Asia CEO Mark Yip estimated the supply of new private homes in the CCR at 1,870 units in 2026, about 30 per cent less than the 2,618 units last year.

He added that this is likely “to further dwindle to 1,395 units in 2027”, suggesting that lower supply would support price growth in the segment.

The tight spread between bids, with just a 9.8 per cent gap between the highest and lowest offers, could be pointing to “greater alignment” among developers and “higher (market) confidence”, Wong added. In comparison, the first Dunearn Road site had a much wider gap of 49 per cent.   

Located a stone’s throw from Sixth Avenue MRT station, the Dunearn Road land parcel has a maximum gross floor area of 30,467 sq m.

Of this, at least 600 sq m will be set aside for a childcare centre and a maximum of 1,400 sq m for commercial spaces on the first floor, including a supermarket of at least 1,000 sq m.

The last condominium launch in the vicinity was Fourth Avenue Residences in 2019. Caveats data showed 25 resale transactions in the 99-year leasehold project in the past year, at a median price of S$2,540 psf. 

More recently, on Apr 1, a 710 sq ft unit changed hands at S$1.9 million or S$2,674 psf. 

Other private homes in the area are mostly freehold developments, noted Song. These include Floridian, Maplewoods, The Cascadia, The Nexus, The Sixth Avenue Residences, The Tessarina and RoyalGreen, which transacted at median prices of S$2,205 to S$2,835 psf in 2025. 

Uncompleted 99-year projects in the CCR include Skye at Holland, River Green and River Modern, which recorded median prices of S$2,948 to S$3,225 psf.

Mogul.sg chief research officer Nicholas Mak thinks the future Dunearn Road project could be launched at above S$3,300 psf next year. He estimates the developers’ break-even price to be between S$2,840 and S$3,000 psf.