Firstly, several blogs have popped up. It's great to see that civil society and activism is strong and vibrant in Singapore, especially since minority owners have barely any space to voice their concerns and dissent.
Dairy Farm Estate at Upper Bukit Timah has started the en-bloc process, and a group of conscientious owners has set up a blog on their estate, to discuss the prospects of selling their homes collectively. You can find the blog here. Tampines Court has also started an anti-enbloc blog, which they said is better late than never! You can find the Tampines Court blog here. And there's another general anti-enbloc blog started by M Goei. You can find her blog here. (I have updated their addresses on my links page as well.)
Secondly, if you haven't read it yet, the Straits Times have done an excellent SEVEN page spread on the flip side of en bloc sales, which they titled "En Bloc Blues". You can find the articles in the CondoSingapore Forum (Many thanks to Mr Funny for putting these up for readers) as well as sites such as sghousing. Thanks must go to the reporters Joyce Teo, Fiona Chan and Keith Lin who contacted many of us and for putting up a balanced view of en blocs. The various articles are available here (titled "En bloc blues", "Riding the en bloc wave", "Many forced to downgrade..", "This is my home..").
Thirdly, the Ministry of Law has started a second round of public consultation. In response to the 100 over feedback from the public (presumably largely from minority owners and dissenters) from their first public consultation, MinLaw has now started to solicit feedback from the pro-sales folks - property consultants and law firms. Information available here.
Finally, some forums have new discussions on en bloc sales over at Stomp and ChannelNewsAsia. I have likewise updated the En Bloc List (will try to do that on weekends when possible). In the following week, I hope to share an analysis/deconstruction of a transcript and minutes of an EOGM where it is blatantly obvious that majority owners will do anything to force the minority owners into a very uncomfortable spot for their holding out on the sale (and hence the majority's profits).
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5 comments:
Hi DrMinority,
Just a courtesy visit.
it is enjoyable to banter with you at REACH.
My time is limited as I am on home vacation and will return to Macau tomorrow.
Hope to catch up with you soon.
cheers,
Lai CF
Hi Lai CF
It's not a banter. I enjoy your discussions. Helps me (and hopefully the REACH forum) to think through some of the issues. The fact that we're talking about the possibility of HDB enblocs and the difficulties we have in agreeing to some of its finer details show just how much work is needed to legislate something like this. Given this, there's more work needed in current enbloc legislation certainly. I only hope the government will take the numerous feedback from ALL stakeholders into consideration.
Have a good trip back to Macau :)
dr m
Oi, achei teu blog pelo google tá bem interessante gostei desse post. Quando der dá uma passada pelo meu blog, é sobre camisetas personalizadas, mostra passo a passo como criar uma camiseta personalizada bem maneira. Até mais.
Apologies to all - have not been able to update the enbloc list and blog in general, due to work commitments. Hope to get things back into gear this weekend (fingers crossed)!
I'm sorry but M Goei's blog comments and her understanding about share values are WRONG! Unfortunately, her "contact us" e-mail doesn't work and there's no provision to leave a comment on her blog! Hence, I have to use Dr Minority's blog space to correct this factual error - apologies for the intrusion, Dr Minority!
It is eminently clear under two statutes (viz, the Land Titles (Strata) Act, Cap 158, Section 30 and the Building Maintenance and Strata Management Act of 2004, Section 62) that share values ALSO represent each apartment owner's "quantum of the undivided share ... in the common property".
Therefore, inclusion of share values in the apportionment of collective sales proceeds is - in my opinion - proper. The $64mn question is: What proportion should be allocated to share values in the apportionment equation? The present practice accepted by the Strata Titles Boards of 50:50 may NOT be based on facts.
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