This $33.8M Freehold Jalan Besar Building Is Up For Sale With 6 Storeys, Offices And Serviced Apartments — But There’s A Catch

Local property developer Sevens Group is selling a renovated commercial building in Jalan Besar for $33.8 million. The two adjoining freehold lots, at 287 and 289 Jalan Besar, are being sold as an amalgamated commercial property.

The recently renovated properties comprise a pair of conserved shophouses as well as a newly built rear extension. Collectively, the property has a total built up area of 9,131.98 sq ft, according to Sevens Group.

The asking price of $33.8 million works out to roughly $13,770 psf on the 2,455 sq ft plot. As a commercial property, it is exempt from Additional Buyer’s Stamp Duty and Seller’s Stamp Duty, and the transaction is open to locals, foreign buyers, and corporate investors.

Before the renovation, the two lots (at 287 and 289 Jalan Besar) were separate double-storey conserved shophouses. But after a renovation that lasted about a year and a half, Sevens Group has refurbished the front block of shophouses and added a new three-storey extension.

The developer estimates that it spent close to $9 million on the renovation of the property.

Now, the property spans six storeys and sits in the Petain Road/Tyrwhitt Road Conservation Area in District 8. Its approved gross floor area (GFA) is about 7,365 sq ft, with a plot ratio of 3.0.

However, during our research in the lead up to this article, we noted that the marketing materials quote a larger built-up figure of about 9,132 sq ft, which the developer says includes voids, air-conditioner ledges and the like.

The approved uses differ floor by floor: a shop on the ground floor, offices on the second floor, and serviced apartments across the four floors above.

The third floor used to be the second floor’s mezzanine, part of the original conserved shophouse. It has since been treated as its own floor, and grouped into the same serviced apartment approval as the fourth, fifth and sixth floors, which are the newly built rear extension.

We also noted that the developer’s marketing brochure lists eight ensuite rooms in total. Based on the approved plans, four of these rooms sit on those approved serviced apartment floors – with one per floor – and we were told that they are fitted out to accommodate the kind of medium-stay tenant that most co-living operators in Singapore tend to cater to.

The other four rooms are on the second floor, where the approved use is ‘Office”. Each “ensuite” there is really a toilet attached to a workspace rather than a bedroom, according to clarifications by Sevens Group.

Another slice of Singapore’s flexible-stay market

Overall, given the renovations and what we can tell from speaking with the developer, the residential part of the renovated building is aimed at meeting the accommodation gap between a standard lease and a hotel stay.

Private homes in Singapore carry a minimum three-month lease, and landlords usually avoid tenancies that are under two years. On the other hand, short stays promoted on platforms like Airbnb are not allowed in Singapore, and this usually leaves medium-stay visitors to choose between high-end serviced apartments and typical residential tenancies.

But the success and entrenchment of co-living operators such as Coliwoo, Hmlet, and Figment, have managed to capitalise on that accommodation gap. The recent listing of Coliwoo and The Assembly Place also reflects institutional interest in these operators.

So it would seem that the upper floors of the building renovated by Sevens Group were built for that segment.

The property has several positive factors that make its location appealing. City Square Mall and a stretch of Jalan Besar F&B are minutes away on foot, and are the type of useful convenience that short- to medium-stay tenants are willing to pay for.

But from our perspective, the catch is that the approval behind this pitch is only partly in place, and only for now.

The approvals are still catching up with the building

Based on public records that we were able to find, they suggest that the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) granted the serviced apartment use on the third to sixth floors for a fixed period, after which it has to be renewed to continue.

A written permission from URA, dated March 2025, does not state an expiry, though Sevens Group says such approvals typically last two years and that it has applied to URA to renew the existing approval.

But since that renewal has not been confirmed, we should point out that a potential buyer would be relying on an approval that could be expiring soon.

Meanwhile, the four offices on the second floor, each with an attached toilet, sit outside the serviced apartment approval entirely. When we conducted our own checks, a change-of-use check we ran through URA’s online service this month came back negative. This means that a new serviced apartment, hotel, and backpackers’ hostel use cannot be supported in the area over concerns about dis-amenities

This condition is expected to hold true for the next six months or so.

Sevens Group says it would rather keep the floor’s layout open, marketing it as offices or co-living rooms and leaving any change of use to the buyer. But for now, that co-living change of use was just declined, and the only use on the second floor that URA allows an application for assessment is a students’ hostel.

The ground floor has a similar concern for us. It has been fitted out with an F&B operator in mind, but the approved use is shop, and even the fit-out stops short of an actual F&B setup: the grease trap is only a provision and has not been installed.

An earlier temporary restaurant permission, granted to the previous owner in 2022, expired in September 2025 and does not carry over to the revamped building.

We cannot speak to any ongoing discussions between the developer and the authorities, but based on what we’ve been able to piece together, this building deserves serious due diligence by any prospective buyer or investor.

The conservation permission from URA, which authorises the works and every floor’s approved use, came with a condition that it would lapse if the development was not completed by 16 August 2026. That deadline has now passed, with the building still described as nearly finished, although Sevens Group says it has applied for an extension.

So, what would the new owner be getting if they pay $33.8 million for this freehold commercial asset?

When we consider the land rate of $13,770 psf, it looks steep compared to comparative projects and transactions in the neighbourhood, where shophouses in the same conservation area have changed hands at roughly $5,990 to $7,301 psf over the past two years.

For example, a freehold unit on Foch Road went for $5,990 psf last August. Two deals in the middle of 2024 saw other similar properties in the same precinct changed hands at $6,474 psf on Foch Road and $7,301 psf on Sam Leong Road, the highest of the recent comparables.

One transaction in the wider district comes close: a small Little India shophouse on Syed Alwi Road that fetched $12,431 psf in March at a total quantum of $10.25 million. At 825 sq ft, it is only a third of this Jalan Besar project’s land area.

We cannot confirm from URA’s caveats whether that price reflects genuine market value, so it does not serve as an accurate data point. The Foch Road and Sam Leong Road deals, both closer to the subject in scale, remain the fairer yardstick for this sale.

In order to determine the difference in price, this usually boils down to how much the plot has been built up and intensified. The approved GFA is nearly three times the land size, whereas a typical two- or three-storey neighbour is far smaller.

On a floor area basis, the asking price works out to about $4,590 psf across the approved GFA of 7,365 sq ft. At the same time, the estimated renovation cost of $9 million is about a quarter of the $33.8 million asking price, and we assume that the rest of the price covers land cost and the developer’s margin.

Based on URA records, one of the two lots, 287 Jalan Besar, was bought for $6.3 million in 2022. The adjoining address at 289 Jalan Besar does not have a caveat, based on the publicly available URA caveats.

But If we assume that the two similar lots cost broadly the same price, then the land rate works out to about $13 million, which points to an all-in cost of around $22 million.

What’s our take on this freehold commercial asset?

As a recently renovated commercial asset whose sale is open to locals and foreign buyers, there’s a good chance that this is likely to draw yield-focused investors and companies who would like to own premises of their own.

Even if all eight ensuite rooms were fully approved, eight is too few for a co-living operator’s business model, which runs on economies of scale: spreading staff, cleaning and management across dozens or hundreds of rooms.

By our approximate calculations, at a transacted price of $33.8 million, the eight rooms work out to more than $4 million each, which no co-living income comes close to supporting.

After reviewing the whole situation, our conclusion is that the rebuild was a chance for Sevens Group to enter the co-living market with a differentiated product, but it has chosen to sell rather than operate it.

The freehold tenure, the well-connected city-fringe address and a finished, fitted-out asset in a tightly held pocket are all genuine strengths. The marketing materials also highlight naming rights and a prominent road frontage, practical draws for a co-living or commercial brand.

But we find it concerning that the building is only partly cleared for the main use case that it is marketed on: the second floor stuck as office space, the ground floor still needing its F&B approval, and the serviced apartment approval itself due for renewal.

We think that settling all of that paperwork is probably going to determine whether $33.8 million is a fair price or an optimistic one for this commercial asset.