Palafox completes urban planning for Mile Long property

MANILA, Philippines — Palafox Associates has completed the urban planning for the 2.9-hectare Mile Long property in Makati City to make it more attractive to potential joint venture partners with the Department of Finance (DOF).

Gerard Chan, chief privatization officer of the DOF’s Privatization Management Office (PMO), said the plan prepared by Palafox would give the government and its joint venture partner an idea on possible redevelopment of the property that was previously leased to Sunvar Realty Development Corp.

“In the meantime, as part of the preparation we hired Palafox to prepare for us a master plan for the whole complex to give us an idea what are the possible developments that we can do for that area,” Chan told reporters.

Under the plan, Chan said Palafox designed a community of mixed-use residential and commercial development divided in four phases or blocks.

According to Chan, the plan has been presented to President Duterte.

“A joint development will happen. The government will contribute the land, while the joint venture partner would develop the property,” he said.

Under the plan, the joint development would include residential as well as office and retail spaces, a condotel or hotel, and parking slots divided in four phases.

The residential cost is about P6.83 billion for average standard and P9.04 billion for high-end design followed by office spaces with P911.9 million to P1.38 billion and retail spaces for P3.16 billion to P4.54 billion. The condotel or hotel is expected to cost P5.87 billion for average standard and P7.27 billion for high end. The parking slots are expected to cost P952 million.

According to Chan, Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez is pushing for a joint venture partnership instead of an outright sale as the property is situated in the prime location in Makati City.

Chan said the government is also negotiating with the Makati City government if it would be possible to put a station of the planned $3.5 billion subway project in the Mile Long property.

“We’re also talking to the Makati City government. We’re also telling if they want one subway stop will be there, near the entrance of the Skyway so we can put a transport hub there,” he said.

Chan said the DOF-attached agency is awaiting an executive order from Malacañang transferring the property to the state-run Bases Conversion Development Authority (BCDA).

“So were trying to look at the possibility of the BCDA entering the picture and the disposition in conjunction with PMO,” he said.

Chan said the property is 71 percent occupied by private tenants and has yielded P160 million in net income over the past two years.

“We’re leasing it out for the preparatory to the disposition. Our objective is to dispose,” he said.

The Mile Long property was previously leased to Sunvar Realty. The lease agreement expired in 2002.