ORTIGAS Land Inc., a company jointly owned by the Ayala and SM groups along with the Ortigas family, hopes to grow at double-digit rates annually in the next five to six years as a result of its series of developments in Metro Manila, as it plays catch-up to bigger property developers.
Jaime Ysmael, the company’s president, said around 70 percent of the company’s revenues is still coming from the sale of its property development projects such as condominium units and office spaces, while the rest comes from its shopping malls.
“But eventually as the new malls and offices come on stream, hopefully the percentage will reverse,” said Ysmael, a former chief finance officer of Ayala Land Inc.
The company had a net income of P2.3 billion last year, a growth of several folds from a mere P100 million in profits, when the company transformed from a family-controlled business in 2014.
“We expect to grow double digit in the next five or six years. There are many opportunities,” he said.
Ortigas Land said it will spend between P15 billion and P20 billion as capital expenditures in the medium term in order to sustain the company’s growth, an amount that, according to Ysmael, is enough to launch two to three projects a year.
“Hopefully more, if we could get more landbank in other areas. But we intend to still continue ramping up to the extent the market is ready. That’s why we want to be in a push-button mode,” he said.
Last week, Ortigas Land unveiled the residential component of its two-tower Galleon in Ortigas Center, from which the company expects to sell some P16 billion as it is one of its most expensive projects to date.
The project forms part of three project launches for the year, on which the company is spending a total of P15 billion.
The property sector continues to enjoy good fundamentals in general despite current challenges, he said.
“There will be hiccups along the way but not major. We believe that as long as the Philippine economy continues to grow at around 5 [-percent] to 6-percent level, we should still be okay as a country. But we also have to be careful as a country. But generally the Philippines still has a lot of advantages,” he said.
“The fundamentals are still there. The macro environment is good. The interest rates have gone down, and will continue to come down, and the remittances are still there and still growing. The tourism still has a lot of potential,” he said.