Luxury properties go on show

Kriengsak Tantiphipop, chief marketing officer for Siam Paragon Development, said yesterday that the company targets sales of nearly Bt10 billion from this 10-day event, after spending Bt10 million to organise it. Up to 20,000 visitors a day are expected. Almost all of the units on display are priced between Bt7 million and Bt100 million.

Aliwassa Pathnadabutr, managing director of CB Richard Ellis Thailand, the sales agent for six of the participating projects, said demand for luxury homes has picked up over the last year.

"A number of home-buyers in the luxury market delayed their decision last year because they were concerned about the country's political uncertainty. But now almost all of them believe that politics this year will be better than last year, so demand for luxury residences will recover this year," she said.

Although the economy shows signs of only slight growth this year, that is not dampening the strong appetite for luxury homes, she said. The company is confident that it will succeed in generating sales of Bt2 billion from the six projects, which are worth up to Bt10 billion.

Somchao Tantaterdtham, president of the Thai Real Estate Association, said the property market has shown remarkable recovery in the first two month of this year.  This is confirmed by transfers from developers to home-buyers in Bangkok in the first two months of this year. Registrations soared 23 per cent to 4,228 units from 3,428 units in the same period of last year.