Profiles

Thailand Real Estate Magazine | Issue 56 January 2006

By: Profile

Interview with Cees of Town & Country Property

Hello Cees, thanks for agreeing to this interview for the Real Estate Magazine. Our readers find these personal glimpses into the working of the real estate agents very interesting. Can we start with you telling me about yourself before you came to Thailand?

Of course! I come from Holland and have probably been working all my life in sales and marketing or related fields. I’m 43 years old, unmarried, and I decided when I was 35 that it was time for a chance. My working territory, so to say, was the triangle of Amsterdam, Rotterdam and The Hague. Originally I am from the Eastern part of Holland.

Reason for me to move to Thailand is because I was a little bit fed up with Holland, and, I guess, the environment in Europe. If you are an entrepreneur and would like to achieve some success or design and establish something, it’s getting tougher on you. I don’t even mention the tax climate of ‘sunny’ Europe… I’ve been involved in the hospitality industry and logistics for example and to help a couple of friends out I agreed to do the architecture/design for a couple of luxury sandwich bars. I remember it took over a year to get all the permits and licenses in place opening up a sandwich bar in the city of The Hague.

I have been working for rather big companies in Holland and operating them, with all the rules and regulations that apply, makes it so difficult to focus on your core business. Most of your effort and attention is put into procedures and things like that, more than anything else instead of focusing on your clients or sales. Although successful, I became very bored and decided to leave Holland. When I announced to a couple of “friends” (acquaintances) that I was going to leave and start a business in Thailand they thought I was crazy. They said: “You have a nice house, a nice car, a good career and you are making quite a bit of money… you must be crazy!” Only my best mates tapped me on the shoulder and complimented me: “Finally”! I had a friend who was staying in Manila Philippines who had a plan to open a fancy restaurant in Thailand. It was a perfect excuse to wrap up things and prepare myself to move to Thailand.

When did you come here then, and how did your plans work out?

I came here about seven years ago and the first objective was to secure a nice location for the restaurant in a good area in Bangkok. It was tough to find a good location. Everything was either already occupied or too expensive so the broker that we used suggested a property that was available here in Pattaya, a double unit on the corner of Soi Post Office and Beach Road. A former outlet of AW fast-food chain. We opened a night-spot called Samsara Lifestyle and it was pretty successful. We had many clients from Bangkok, movie stars and many trendy people knew where to find us. One of those was a company called Tricon International Restaurants who held the franchise for Pizza Hut. That was in (I think) 2000. That was why Samsara closed. We sold to them and it’s now another Pizza Hut outlet.

I decided to create my own business here in Pattaya and later on began working with an interior designer. We did many residential renovation projects and commercial projects, interiors of bars and hotels and so on. Before I considered moving on to become a building agency that was involved in design, architecture, construction and sales of properties that was probably the time when Town and Country Property came along and I decided to join.

Who founded the company?

Town & Country Property was founded by two people. They had recently opened the business when I met them. We worked well together and I became involved with Town & Country Property just one month after they opened for business. That was in 2003. All of a sudden a very small group became a much bigger group because I brought with me nine staff members so Town and Country Property was not just a broker but a broker with the facility to design and construct private residences or convert places into a commercial bar or a restaurant etc. This whole company evolved into one which dealt with all kinds of property matters. We became so successful and had so many enquiries and so much work, but at the same time we were working as developers and looking at developing our own projects, that last year, in December, we decided to end our entire individual commercial and residential projects so were stopped taking customers who wanted us to design and construct single residences, what was in effect turnkey projects. We could then focus our attention on our own projects, which is what we still do.

What projects are you currently working on?

We have three projects at the moment. “Whispering Palms”, a luxury project of sixteen villas near the entrance to The Horseshoe Point, the equestrian centre near Mabprachan reservoir. We have The Meadows, a unique modern residential development of 64 houses being built at the top of Soi Nern Plub Wan, and Nova Residence Jomtien, a condominium being built at Soi 17 Thepprasit just behind Jomtien Park Villas. A very up-and-coming location in the heart of Jomtien. All in all we are quite active for a relatively young company. Guess we are quite blessed with a number of talented and experienced staff-members.

When you joined the company what position were you in and how did you progress to your current position?

I started heading the department architecture and turnkey contracting. Then I was a minor shareholder of the company. Over the years a fourth partner came in and later the initial two founders of the company were bought out by us, so together with my Belgian partner we operate the business on a 50 – 50 basis. I am the Managing Director who oversees the day-to-day operations and has personal involvement in all of our marketing, sales and advertising. I’m sales driven; enjoy dealing with clients and like designing art-graphics. My partner Herman, who has an extensive back-ground and experience in construction and development, is taking care of that side of the business. A great combination I would say and a very pleasant working relationship.

How big the company is and what staff do you have now?

We are a very service-oriented company; you need to have sufficient team members in place to be so. We are constantly remodeling the office space and as you can see we are now renovating the left side of the building. That will become our showroom where we will show our project-models and have a guest lounge. There are two floors above us where our designers, architects and accountants work. Our sales office accommodates a very powerful force of sales consultants and sales and marketing assistants. We focus on quality and are service minded; we do not want to be the biggest realtor in Pattaya; simply the best!

What types of buyers are you getting and how are they buying?

There are two types of buyers and I like them both. There are those who are interested in a condo and there are those interested in a house. Two different profiles. People that are interested in a house don’t mind registering it into a company. I have only come across a very small number who would register the house into a Thai person’s name. People that buy a condo are interested in buying it in their own name. Only when the percentage allowed for purchase by a foreigner is reached they will, especially if the project is very nice, register it into a company name. We rarely see Thai people buying through an agency. They will visit a project-site by themselves, go into the sales office and make their purchase. There is plenty of opportunity for them to do so, they hardly go to an agency and say they are looking for a property. I can easily say that 95% of our customers are foreign. Many different countries but dominated by UK buyers either as end-users or investors. We have a very colorful mix of buyers, those looking for a real bargain and those looking for the utmost luxury. Even through Internet we are very successful to cater to our foreign investors. Probably 60% of all our sales are based on referrals; which, in my opinion is quite unique for such a young company. Apart from buyers we also see a strong growth of quality tenants interested to rent a luxury home or condo. Those gain property owners an interesting return on their investments up to 10%-12% in some cases. A very healthy market.

What are your thoughts on the property market here in Pattaya?

Property in general is moving. You would think that there is an overload of affordable properties as there are so many villages being built, from starter prices at just under 1 million (Bt), but still they are moving quite fast. A new development starts and within 2 years or so it is fully completed and sold out. Now, people are moving to better quality houses at affordable prices rather than the standard style roof-to-roof-type of village developments, where the developers tries to put in as many properties as possible rather than a little more elegant and a little more spacious with better quality.

For the future I would say starter-class developments will get better quality and there is a strong demand for luxury developments. Having been here for seven years I have seen what is going on and know the market from the early stages up until now. I have seen tremendous change from three or four years ago when someone with serious money in their pocket couldn’t spend it on top-quality housing because it simply wasn’t available. Individual residences perhaps, but a secure development where you had a choice of really nice properties, maybe starting at 10 million Bt or more, simply were very hard to find. If you look at the market now there are properties around for 1 million US Dollars, or even more. Even those developments seem to sell. The type of people who visit or live in Pattaya is also changing. Many years ago the single bachelor came to Pattaya for alcohol and ‘company’, stayed at very affordable hotel accommodation or bought a condo for 1 or 2 million. It is now changing to many more families, couples and people with higher budgets spending serious money on a high quality product.

As for developments and availability in Pattaya, forget Central Pattaya. Everything is already taken; most of it is commercial property, with a few small exceptions like North-shore which is now almost finished. In the early days places like Soi Nern Plub Wan were THE residential development areas. If you go along it and look at the small Soi’s you will see smaller and bigger villages built in there. They aren’t always noticeable because if you drive along you see only shop-houses. It’s a typical technique of Thai developers. They have a land parcel fronting on to a road, they make a nice garden with a security gate on a road leading in to the village and when everything is nearly sold the garden disappears and shop-houses are being built. That is the reason Soi’s like Nern Plub Wan have many shop-houses. The developers then moved over to other Soi’s like Khow Noi, Khow Thalo. It isn’t finished yet. Developers moved to Mabprachan, though now with zoning regulations, no new housing developments are allowed there.

“East Pattaya” is still the strongest residential area of Pattaya and most likely will be so for many more years to come. It offers starters-housing projects up to exclusive projects like the luxury Siam Royal View. There are now a few hot areas around Pattaya with lots of activity. Wong Amart (north Pattaya – Naklua) is quite hot, it has always been a favorable area for the richer Thais and the German crowd. The coastline is now dominated by commercial developments and luxury condominiums like Saranchol. We see quite a few up-market hotels going up in that area as well.

Pratumnak (Buddha Hill) with a combination of low rise condominiums and luxury, nicely finished houses, is definitely one of the hottest spots in town. Over the last couple of years you didn’t see much activity but land parcels were rapidly changing hands. Since the beginning of this year more and more end-users finally got their plot of land and started to build their dream home or development. Land prices in that area are relatively expensive, approximately 25,000 Bt per talang wah. But I still see a growth around. There is also quite a bit of activity in Jomtien, with a variety of condos and houses available. Especially with all new infrastructures going in at this moment, the ‘back-drop’ of Jomtien is getting more and more popular. Just a matter of a few more years before people will notice it.

Thank you very much Cees. .