A COUPLE who bought a home and refused to pay the seller’s agent the 1 per cent commission are being taken to court by a property company.

PropNex associate director Ricky Low Yong Sern is seeking about $4,000 in commission or a service fee in a case that is likely to turn the spotlight on the issue of whether home buyers should pay a fee to sellers’ agents.

He was the exclusive agent handling the sale of a terrace house in Whampoa built over 30 years ago and classified as a Housing Board flat.

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THE broader economic backdrop for the Singapore property market generally looks weak in the next 18 months, says Mr Don Hanna, Citi’s global head of emerging markets economic and market analysis.

‘The level of economic activity that we foresee in general continues to weaken this year and next,’ he told reporters on the sidelines of Citi’s closed-door Asia Pacific property conference at the Ritz-Carlton Millenia hotel yesterday.

One of the implications of the United States subprime crisis is that central banks in Singapore and many other nations are more concerned about the way real estate is financed, he said.

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THE residential property sector may be cooling but the office sector is still relatively hot.

United States investment bank Lehman Brothers and the regional arm of Japan-based Kajima have just sold

an office building development at 71 Robinson Road to a German buyer.

The price was a hefty $743.75 million, sources say, though the sum was not officially disclosed.

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THE Economic Development Board (EDB), which has been hugely successful in attracting big foreign companies to set up job-creating operations in Singapore, is now turning its sights on rich individuals.

It has teamed up with the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) to scour the globe for rich, entrepreneurial foreigners to start businesses in Singapore - creating vital new jobs.

Together, EDB and MOM will run Contact Singapore - an 11-year-old programme previously run by MOM alone. Contact Singapore’s main objective was getting talented individuals to work in the Republic.

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A NEW 550-bed hospital in Jurong will open by 2015, said Health Minister Khaw Boon Wan yesterday, almost a decade later than originally planned.The long-promised hospital was put on hold in favour of Khoo Teck Puat Hospital in Yishun, which is slated to open in 2010 and provide much-needed beds for the north. Mr Khaw told the media yesterday the tender for the Jurong hospital could be delayed until 2010 because of sky-high construction costs. With several major projects going on right now, including the two integrated resorts, demand for labour and supplies is red-hot.

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THE Greenspan Federal Reserve never cut the funds rate by more than 0.5 percentage point at any one time.

The Bernanke Fed has done so twice in two months. Sharp reductions in the funds rate have been supplemented with numerous other initiatives.

Even so, we believe Fed officials have failed to prevent a recession. Their objective is now to avert a long and deep recession by limiting the fallout in financial markets. On that basis, we expect them to succeed eventually.

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Inflation is greater worry for S’pore

CONSUMERS in the United States need to repair their balance sheets. They are heavily leveraged. They need to save more.

We are looking for signs of recovery for the US housing market. The reduction in property values has a wealth effect and will affect consumer spending.

We are looking at a U-shaped recovery at least over the next two years or so. We will be examining the financial reports of the players, to see if they have hit the bottom.

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Keep track of ETFs By Lorna Tan

Exchange-traded funds are gaining popularity among investors as a viable investment option. Lorna Tan looks at the advantages and pitfalls of investing in ETFs

GRAPHICS: MIKE M DIZON Retail investors who want to make their money work harder for them are finding exchange-traded funds (ETFs) a viable option. The main attraction is their low cost compared with traditional instruments such as unit trusts.Listed on a stock exchange, ETFs are baskets of stocks that typically aim to track the performance of a stock market index. ETFs can also be theme-driven, focusing on certain asset classes or commodities such as gold and agriculture.

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Cash over valuation falls as units are more accurately valued to reflect market prices

By Jessica Cheam

House-hunting for soon-to-be-married Jolyn Toh used to be a discouraging affair as prices were out of her reach.

But things are looking up for the engineer.

Just six months ago, home-owners in Bukit Batok, where she is looking to buy an HDB flat, used to demand nothing less than $50,000 cash upfront.

In the last month, however, this has dipped to about $20,000 to $30,000. ‘This difference means my fiance and I can now afford a home before our wedding in July,’ said Ms Toh, 25.

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