Sale Committee Meeting No 12 Notice

URA finally acts

Q: What do you get when you relax planning regulations, unleash en bloc madness on the general population and then turn a blind eye to the unsightly chaos that ensues?  

A: Singpore's building frenzy 2007 - present day.  Smaller and smaller apartments, more congested roads, higher stress levels, loss of greenery, shrinking of facilities, rise in temperatures, truly awful architecture and cookie-cutter designs, overpriced units, overall lower standard of living.

The URA's encouragement of mass en bloc of any plot of land has resulted in the chaotic mess that is today.  It has taken them a long time, but today, someone in that department  finally woke up and realised that things were getting ugly. 

THEY HAVE JUST ISSUED A NEW CIRCULAR HERE ON MEASURES TO IMPROVE THE LIVING ENVIRONMENT OF NON-LANDED RESIDENTIAL PROPERTIES (AFTER THEY  MESSED IT UP BIG TIME)

'A minimum plot size requirement of 1,000sqm is introduced for all new flat developments island-wide to safeguard a better quality residential development. This will align flat developments with other residential developments like landed housing and condominiums which also have minimum plot size controls.'

One small step in the right direction. One giant leap of common sense.

This does not have any effect on TC, of course, because we are so huge; but it will prevent other small developments from going en bloc. They would need to increase the plot size by amalgamating with a neighbouring plot, and that makes the whole process so much more daunting.

And over in Bedok madness still reigns: 
Bedok Residences sell like hotcakes

"CapitaLand said most buyers rushed in to make their selection without even viewing the showrooms.
A unit costs between S$1,100 to S$1,500 per square foot."

They're back

I have to admit to thoroughly enjoying the last six weeks of en bloc silence. Not being bothered by CSAs or EGMs put us back into a normal mode of living (by enlarge).. I even nurtured a faint hope that perhaps the sale committee had disbanded and all matters en bloc abandoned ... but alas, it was just a dream. It was nice while it lasted, though.

They are back with a bang.

Two sets of Minutes and a Meeting Notice for the next meeting to held on 19 Nov. The as yet unseen draft CSA will be presented to the owners in January (tentative date 7.1.12) for their approval. I shall not be commenting on this CSA until after all owners have received their copy along with the Notice for EGM.
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One more SC member bites the dust, so that brings the number down to 9 in total. Still a large group by any measure.

Sale Committee Meeting No 11 Notice

See comment on item 9 in below post...

SC Meeting: 12 Nov 2011

SC Minutes 10 (Edited)

 

The Vice-Chairman again looking out for the best interests of the owners by suggesting the RP be raised to the original proposal given by the MA in their presentation - only to be shot down by the majority consensus.  It looks like the original proposal was just the usual lure and it's just down, down, down from here on in. The old and tired mantra that "the RP was adopted by the SPs" is a cop out and used by a committee as a shield to mask their inaction. What 'current market situation' did they put forward? Did anyone offer charts or qualify their opinion with facts? Have they done any real analysis or are they relying on the marketing agents vested interest viewpoint?

4. The Chairman of the SC will be writing to the  MC Chairman seeking formal confirmation of the collection of Enbloc Sale fund by the MC, as decided at the last EGM on 24.09.20011

Hold you horses here! No such thing was ever agreed at the last EGM. The resolution presented to and passed by the owners was:-

'To resolve and set up an Enbloc sale fund to meet the preliminary enbloc expenses, out of pocket expenses, meeting expenses, independant valuers/property agent fees and authorise  SC to collect and account for such funds.'

The MC is not and should not be entangled in the money matters of en bloc. They follow the BMSM, the SC follow the LTSA and they only overlap at the holding of the EGMs.  The MC is not there to do administrative work for the sale committee or their backers and they are certainly not debt collectors for errant majority owners. What the SC should do is formally ask for the Strata Roll (and pay the administrative fee as this is stated in the LTSA) and do their own collecting. The SC are prohibited from using MCST funds, and this would include the large amount spent on stationary and postage that would necessarily be involved in collecting sums of money from owners, not to mention the time taken away from the managing agent in his official duties in overseeing the maintenance of the estate. 

Gimcrack rules

Anonymous said:

"Is it true that as long we have not sign on the TA, we have not activated the 1 year 80% rule. If so, why don't we bide our time. When the economy turn around, we short circuit the en bloc process by launching TC ahead of our competitors "

Hmm..... you mean hold back on the first signature until the time is right?

Looking back at the Third Schedule it says:

Termination of collective sale committee  

12. —(1) A collective sale committee may be dissolved —
(a) by ordinary resolution at a general meeting of the management corporation convened in accordance with the Second Schedule; or
(b) upon the termination or expiry of the collective sale agreement.
[46/2007]
(2)    A collective sale committee that is constituted for the purposes of a collective sale of all lots and the common property in a strata title plan to which section 84A or 84FA applies, or a collective sale of all the flats and land in a development to which section 84D or 84E applies, shall be dissolved if —
(a) in the case of such a committee that is constituted before the date of commencement of section 10(g) of the Land Titles (Strata) (Amendment) Act 2010, at the end of a period of 12 months after that date; or
(b) in any other case, at the end of a period of 12 months after the committee is constituted, there is no collective sale agreement for that collective sale or no subsidiary proprietor or proprietor, as the case may be, has executed a collective sale agreement for that collective sale.

It seems pretty clear that if there is a draft CSA then there must be at least 1 signature to make it an active document within the 12 months starting from the date of the EGM to elect the sale committee.  

So the answer to your question is no, the sale committee cannot be in existence forever, they cannot keep the estate in limbo by withholding that first signature until the opportune time. Parliament has set the parameters, their intentions are clear, there has to be time limitations on the process. The SC has until their January deadline to a) get the terms and conditions of a CSA passed at an EGM and b) activate it with a single signature. The first signature will be the Date of the Agreement and from there on in they will have a second 12 months (until Jan 2013 in our case)  to reach the 80%.

It was under the old rules that a sale committee could hang about doing nothing, lying inactive for months, even years.  Now they have
[SC election]........[CSA/1st signature] :- 12 mths
[CSA/1st signature ........... 80%] :- 12 mths
[80%......conditional sale.......new80%....application for sale to STB] :- 12 mths

If this reading is not correct, then I will eat my hat. 
In fact someone ought to write to the sale committee with this question. 
Not me, as they don't seem to answer my queries....

Supplemental Agreement

A Supplemental Agreement (SA) is a legal document amending one or more terms in the original Agreement. If 80% of owner signatures are required for the Agreement to be valid then so must it be for the Supplemental Agreement.

Only, they don't have to be the same 80%. The owners who do not agree to the new term(s) are deemed to have withdrawn from the Agreement and are no longer treated as a Signatory to the Agreement. New owners can sign up for the Supplemental Agreement and they become part of the new 80%.

I smell a RAT here; why would owners who refused to sign for a higher RP choose to sign for a lower RP? Are there side agreements going on? Top ups from the developer, maybe?

SIGNING makes it look like the owners have the POWER TO CHOOSE ... but my question is; do they really?

In the CSA terms, there may be a clause or clauses dotted about that restrict the owner from exercising his freedom of choice. For example, it might state that the owner must render his full co-operation and efforts to assist the sale committee in the discharge of its duties and obligations.  The owner might also have to sign any document to effect any of the purposes in the Agreement, and not to do anything by way of act or omission that might jeopardize the sale or be detrimental to the fulfillment of any of the terms of the Agreement.

If they do not sign, then they may be in breach of their obligations and the SC can sue them.  Deep trouble of the owners' own making.

So does signing any document also cover the Supplemental CSA?  I don't know, but it's a question.

I have come across two types of Supplemental Agreements:

• A Supplemental Agreement  to lower the Reserve Price (Koon Seng House), (Marine Point)
• A Supplemental Agreement to extend the validity of the Agreement (Gillman Heights)

Koon Seng was the one that put the cat among the pigeons by declaring that the SA is a fresh agreement and another 12 months added. Sheesh! 

I am not sure if a contractual promise that it won't is stronger than a High Court judgement that it will - I'd need a lawyer to answer that! In the meantime, caution dictates that you go with the High Court interpretation and not a contractual wish.

Marine Point was another condominium which signed a Supplemental Agreement to lower the reserve price. This was because the Proposed Sale Price from a buyer was lower than the RP.  The valuation at close of tender was high - too high for the Proposed Sale Price.  So, instead of sticking to their guns they did another tender and another valuation from a different valuer (since the first guy said his valuation was correct and stuck by it) - and it turned out to be magically lower ..... so they could go ahead with the sale. Another sheesh!

Now Gillman Heights had a Supplemental Agreement to extend the validity of the Agreement since they were running out of time. It caused a lot of problems as many owners refused to sign and 4 of them brought it to the High Court. In that instance, 20 owners who had signed the CSA refused to sign the SA - but 26 fresh owners did sign. The CSA and S&P had opposite clauses; the CSA stated that "the Vendors shall  not be required to execute the Supplemental Agreement"  and in the S&P, it stated that agreement from the 80% was necessary. The judge went with the CSA.

A supplemental Agreement is a FRESH Agreement

KOON SENG HOUSE

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Goh Teh Lee v Lim Li Pheng Maria and Others [2009] SGHC 242
27 Oct 2009

Whether the application to the Board for a collective sale order was out of time
35 The plaintiff contended that the application to the Board, which was made on 16 April 2008 for a collective sale order, was out of time. In his view, the application had to be made within 12 months after the first owner appended his signature to the first CSA, that is, by 28 December 2007. This view was erroneous for two reasons.

36 First, where an earlier CSA had failed to achieve its intended purpose, ie, to sell the land to a purchaser, the proprietors of the land could not be precluded from making a new agreement with a lower reserve price. Hence, the supplemental agreement constituted a fresh agreement. Therefore, time for the purpose of para 1A(a) of the Schedule should be reckoned from the date the first signature was appended to the supplemental agreement.

37 Second, s 84E(3)(b) provides that proprietors holding not less than 80% of the aggregate share value may apply to the Board for a collective sale order. At the earliest, the 12-month period within which application may be made to the Board starts when 80% majority has been reached or first crossed (as the case may be). The plaintiff was therefore wrong to say that time for this purpose started running from the date of the first signature. There are two distinct 12-month periods. As I said, application may be made to the Board as soon as 80% majority has been reached or first crossed. However, this does not mean that the 12-month period within which application must be made to the Board necessarily starts then (see para 1(a) of the Schedule). For example, it could start at a later date when a greater percentage majority is reached so long as the time elapsed from the first signature to the time when such desired majority is reached is also not greater than 12 months (see para 1A of the Schedule).

38 The first signature to the supplemental agreement was appended on 24 March 2007 and the last was on 6 September 2007 (well within the 12-month period within which a majority of not less than 80% had to be reached). The other 12-month period (ie, that within which application to the Board had to be made) commenced on 6 September 2007. Therefore, the application made on 16 April 2008 was well within time.

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It seems this ruling has opened up an avenue for the sale committee and the 80% majority to extend the 12 month validity period for the CSA set in the LTSA Schedule indefinitely. They can piggyback a supplemental agreement to start a new 12 months afresh just before the old one runs out. This could theoretically become an instrument of abuse if, say, a SC and a jittery majority can't find a buyer and don't want to process to end after all their 'hard work' - all they would need do is trot out a new CSA with a minor adjustment (for justification's sake should it be challenged) and Bob's your uncle. There is no mention of by how much the Sale Price can be lowered so , theoretically, it could be a nominal $1.00 

It beggars the question why set time limits at all?

• Once a sale committee is elected; they can twiddle their thumbs for a full 12 months. What on earth is the MinLaw thinking about here. All the time in the world given to these people at the beginning and NO TIME given to owners to decide on the bids at the end. 
• It can be argued in court that if the CSA can be extended with a fresh 12 months through a supplemental CSA, then so too the SC's tenure - that's only logical, you can't have one without the other.
• An estate can be kept in limbo with successive SCSAs until an eventual sale; that is the only finality possible.
• Once you sign a CSA; you cannot rescind (except during the initial 5 day cooling off period).

Waiting for Godot yet again

The EGM 3 was held on 24 September.
Since then, there has been:

• No summary of that meeting posted on Notice Boards
• No sign of a CSA
• No information on the SC website (abandoned?)
• No requisition for EGM 4 at the MC office
• A request made to the MC for the units which have bought over the recess area (according to the latest MCST  meeting minutes). So at this late stage, they are still mucking about trying to find out basic details.

After the last EGM, there was a non-productive SC meeting held on 1st Oct and nothing since. If they are planning to have an EGM4, it cannot be any sooner than the 3 Dec now. December is a month when many owners will be away on  vacation, so perhaps they might even be planning to skip December altogether and make a last-ditch attempt in  January.

They only need a valid  CSA before the 28 Jan 2012 midnight deadline.

Perhaps this sale committee should do us all a favour and throw in the towel now. Even the strongly pro-en bloc crowd have gone quite over the last while. The optimism at the beginning has all but died and I don't know anyone who believes this sale has a snowall's chance in hell of happening. Not this time round. Thousands of sinking fund dollars have been spent on this useless exercise to date, we should recognise now that it is dead in the water, that there can be no chance of success in the present uncertain financial climate. If there is no CSA at the 1 year deadline then the sale committee will dissolve automatically and spark a 'relevant' event in accordance with the 2nd Schedule.

Laguna Park put up for Sale again at $1.25b

Nov 2011 Media

• Bedok residences sell like hotcakes - Nov 24
• Size does matter - Nov 2011
• Dragon Mansion sold - Nov 2011
• Supplies, supplies, supplies! - Nov 2011
• Laguna Park, Henry Park apartments up for collective sale -  Nov 2011
• En bloc wave unlikely sign of rebound in market - Oct 2011
• Collective sales market healthy despite downturn - Oct 2011

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