SINGAPORE – Wee Hur Holdings is entering Singapore’s purpose-built student accommodation (PBSA) market with a 1,398-bed Y-Suites development at Nanyang Technological University (NTU).
The Singapore-listed property and construction group said on Oct 16 that NTU had issued it a Letter of Award for the project, following a competitive expression-of-interest and request-for-proposal process.
The award covers the design, construction, financing, operation and maintenance of the accommodation facility. The parties are working towards finalising an agreement, with the award subject to its terms and conditions.
Upon completion, the project is expected to be Singapore’s largest privately developed and operated student accommodation facility within an autonomous university campus, Wee Hur said.
The development will mainly house postgraduate students, with a limited number of beds allocated to undergraduates. It will also be Wee Hur’s first Y Suites-branded asset in Singapore.
Construction is targeted to begin in the third quarter of 2027, with operations scheduled to start by the beginning of the 2029-30 academic year, subject to approvals from NTU and the regulatory authorities.
The project will be undertaken through a special-purpose vehicle, with Wee Hur responsible for the development from design and construction through to operations and maintenance.
The roughly 6,000 sq m greenfield site is located next to 30 Nanyang Link within NTU’s main campus. The project vehicle will be granted an initial 20-year land lease, with options for two five-year extensions, subject to the definitive agreement.
Wee Hur Property chief executive Goh Chengyu said the award will add to the group’s development pipeline and provide greater visibility for its construction activities.
He added: “By developing the PBSA from the ground up and operating it over the long term, we can apply our experience across the full real estate life cycle – from design and construction through to operations.”
The project also expands Wee Hur’s student accommodation business into a third market, after Australia and Hong Kong, as the group builds out its Y Suites platform across the Asia-Pacific.
Goh Wee Ping, Wee Hur Holdings’ chief investment officer and chief executive of Wee Hur Capital, said bringing Y Suites to Singapore was “an important step” in the group’s ambition to build a regional PBSA platform.
“Working with NTU allows us to bring our experience to our home market while further scaling a platform that we believe can create long-term value for the group,” he said. THE BUSINESS TIMES
