Top bid for Dairy Farm condo site is 5.7% lower than nearby plot sold a year ago
An Urban Redevelopment Authority tender for a 99-year leasehold private housing site at Dairy Farm Walk closed on January 22 with five bids received.
A consortium made up of ABR Holdings, LWH Holdings, Macly Capital and Roxy Pacific submitted the top bid of S$427 million, which works out to approximately S$962 per square foot per plot ratio (psf ppr).
This top bid was about 5.7 per cent lower than the S$1,020 psf ppr achieved for a nearby site sold in January 2025.
That January 2025 site is now being developed into a 540-unit condominium project called Nara Residences, by a consortium of Santarli, Apex Asia, Soon Li Heng Group and Kay Lim Realty. Sales bookings for Nara Residences are scheduled to begin on January 31.
The latest top bid of S$962 psf ppr was also approximately 1.8 per cent lower than the S$980 psf ppr paid by Sim Lian Land and Sim Lian Development for another nearby plot in a state tender that closed in March 2022. That plot is being developed into The Botany at Dairy Farm, a 386-unit project launched in 2023, which had only one unit left unsold as at December 2025.
For context on the existing private housing supply in the area, Nara Residences provides a reference point for pricing, scale and positioning within the Dairy Farm estate.
The Dairy Farm Walk tender closed with five bids, which is within the expected range of one to six bids anticipated by analysts. The top bid of S$962 psf ppr sits near the lower end of analyst forecasts of S$900 to S$1,150 psf ppr.
The site spans nearly 317,000 square feet and can yield about 480 private homes. It is surrounded by greenery including Chestnut Close Park, Dairy Farm Nature Park and Bukit Timah Nature Reserve. To the north of the site is the Chestnut landed housing estate.
The Dairy Farm Walk site is within a one-kilometre radius of Bukit Panjang Primary School and CHIJ Our Lady Queen of Peace.
One consideration highlighted by property consultants is that the nearest MRT station, Hillview station on the Downtown Line, is about 700 metres away, which is estimated to be a 15-minute walk along an unsheltered route.
The second-highest bid came from a joint venture between GuocoLand and Intrepid Investments, which offered about S$959 psf ppr, just 0.4 per cent lower than the top bid.
This was followed by a S$926 psf ppr bid from the consortium developing Nara Residences. Kingsford submitted a bid of about S$850 psf ppr, while the lowest bid, from Sim Lian Land and Sim Lian Development, was approximately S$840 psf ppr.
The spread between the highest and lowest bid was 14.6 per cent. CBRE head of research for Singapore and Southeast Asia Tricia Song said this reflects some consensus on the site, which has the appeal of privacy and proximity to nature, but is relatively far from the MRT station and has limited surrounding amenities.
Huttons Asia chief executive officer Mark Yip said developers appeared confident about demand in this private residential locale and in the outside central region, though the future project on the site may potentially compete with Nara Residences when launched.
PropNex head of research and content Wong Siew Ying noted that the site’s plot ratio of 1.4 is lower than the 2.1 plot ratio for four other private housing sites sold in the Dairy Farm area since 2012. A lower plot ratio limits the amount of floor space that can be built and may result in a low-rise development spread across multiple blocks, potentially raising construction costs.
Justin Quek, deputy group chief executive officer of Realion (OrangeTee & ETC) Group, said the healthy response to the tender was not surprising, citing the site’s proximity to amenities such as HillV2 and The Rail Mall.
ERA Singapore chief executive officer Marcus Chu said the site is well-positioned to serve family buyers, with several established primary schools nearby. He added that its closeness to greenery makes it attractive to buyers who value a nature-centric lifestyle.
URA has specified building height controls for the site, including a maximum of four storeys along the boundary facing a canal and the landed housing to the north, and up to six storeys on the rest of the site. These controls may have contributed to the measured bidding levels.
Knight Frank Singapore head of research Leonard Tay said that with a possible average launch price of around S$2,100 psf, the future development may appeal to HDB upgraders in the west of Singapore, as well as buyers working in nearby commercial and industrial areas. It could also attract local homeowners looking to downgrade from nearby landed housing estates such as Chestnut and Cashew.
