http://www.straitstimes.com/Breaking+News/Singapore/Story/STIStory_384715.html
3 days to leave
Landlord told a month ago to tear down partitions by June 3 as planning rules breached, but it kept mum
By Tan Weizhen
A group of residents who had gathered at The Grangeford condo lobby on Sunday night to debate their options decided to call the police, who came and recorded their complaint. -- PHOTO: SAMUEL HE
TWO hundred tenants living in 140 apartments in a condominium off Orchard Road were caught off-guard after being told on Sunday night that they have to clear out by Wednesday.
Their landlord, Ideal Accommodation, had known for at least a month that the tenants - a mix of mostly young expatriate and local professionals and college students - would have to leave, but kept the news from them. As a result, many of the tenants are now livid.
Ideal, which had leased The Grangeford condo from Overseas United Enterprise (OUE), had converted 140 apartments into 600 self-contained rooms. It began sub-letting them this year.
Doing so, however, breached planning rules, and on April 29, the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) told Ideal that it would have to tear down the partitions by June 3.
However, the company kept mum, and began telling tenants that they had to move out only last week. Even then, not all residents were told. Most found out only on Sunday, when they happened to walk past the property office, or got wind of it from their neighbours.
The affected residents - from places such as the United States, Hong Kong, South Korea, India and Vietnam - had signed tenancy agreements of between six months and a year.
The condo building was sold en-bloc to OUE in 2007. However, the company decided to sub-let the building, rather than redevelop the site, because of the deteriorating economic climate.
Ideal spent $3 million to divide up the apartments into smaller units, and rented each out for between $900 and $1,400.
The partitioned units each came equipped with a washing machine, LCD television set and Internet connection.
According to calculations by residents and property agents, dividing an apartment into several units this way can fetch rentals of up to $8,000, compared to about $4,600 if a flat is leased to just one tenant.
Read the full report in Tuesday's edition of the Straits Times.
[email protected]
3 days to leave
Landlord told a month ago to tear down partitions by June 3 as planning rules breached, but it kept mum
By Tan Weizhen
A group of residents who had gathered at The Grangeford condo lobby on Sunday night to debate their options decided to call the police, who came and recorded their complaint. -- PHOTO: SAMUEL HE
TWO hundred tenants living in 140 apartments in a condominium off Orchard Road were caught off-guard after being told on Sunday night that they have to clear out by Wednesday.
Their landlord, Ideal Accommodation, had known for at least a month that the tenants - a mix of mostly young expatriate and local professionals and college students - would have to leave, but kept the news from them. As a result, many of the tenants are now livid.
Ideal, which had leased The Grangeford condo from Overseas United Enterprise (OUE), had converted 140 apartments into 600 self-contained rooms. It began sub-letting them this year.
Doing so, however, breached planning rules, and on April 29, the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) told Ideal that it would have to tear down the partitions by June 3.
However, the company kept mum, and began telling tenants that they had to move out only last week. Even then, not all residents were told. Most found out only on Sunday, when they happened to walk past the property office, or got wind of it from their neighbours.
The affected residents - from places such as the United States, Hong Kong, South Korea, India and Vietnam - had signed tenancy agreements of between six months and a year.
The condo building was sold en-bloc to OUE in 2007. However, the company decided to sub-let the building, rather than redevelop the site, because of the deteriorating economic climate.
Ideal spent $3 million to divide up the apartments into smaller units, and rented each out for between $900 and $1,400.
The partitioned units each came equipped with a washing machine, LCD television set and Internet connection.
According to calculations by residents and property agents, dividing an apartment into several units this way can fetch rentals of up to $8,000, compared to about $4,600 if a flat is leased to just one tenant.
Read the full report in Tuesday's edition of the Straits Times.
[email protected]
