Dec 16, 2008 Letter to Mr Lim Hng Kiang

To : Mr Lim Hng Kiang
Minister; Ministry of Trade and Industry
Cc: Mrs Ow Foong Pheng, CEO, JTC Corporation
Mr Lim Swee Say, MP for Holland and Bukit Timah GRC
Mr Han Chiaw Juan, Director of Housing Development Group
Ms Lisa Toi

Dear Minister Lim Hng Kiang,
Subject:
Urgent Request to Review Extremely High Rental Renewal Rates for Existing Residents of Chip Bee Gardens in a period of unprecedented global economic strife

You are our very last resort on the subject that has caused immense concern and emotional turmoil for our community of residents at Chip Bee Gardens.
For the past 2 weeks and after 2 email appeals on 2nd Dec and 15th Dec to JTC, our community of long-term residents at Chip Bee Gardens have tried unsuccessfully to engage with your statutory board, JTC, to work with us as a community to find a socially responsible and fair solution to the subject during a period of intense economic hardships that is expected to worsen even further in 2009.
We are also appealing to our Member of Parliament, Mr. Lim Swee Say for his support and assistance on this matter.
We seek your ministry's assistance to help us mediate what we believe to be an extremely harsh commercial decision by JTC to impose exorbitantly high rental renewals for existing tenants of Chip Bee Gardens during a period when Singapore is in an economic recession and even the World Bank acknowledges that the world is facing its bleakest growth outlook in 40 years!
To showcase this, below please find a table that compares past (2006) and current (Dec08-Jan09) examples of Residential Rental Renewal Rates from 2 other government agencies; SLA and LTA; in addition to JTC.
Government Agency (Landlord):
JTC
Singapore Land Authority
Land Transport Authority
Managing Agent:
EM Services
DTZ
PREMAS
Property Project:
Chip Bee Gardens
Alexander Park
Monk's Hill Terrace (Newton Circus)
House Type:
1. 1356sqft corner-terrace
(Tenant is a Small-Biz PR with 7.5yrs in Chip Bee)
2. 1356sqft intermed-terrace
(Tenant is a Sporean Retiree with 16.5yrs in Chip Bee)
· 2700sqft bungalow with 5000sqft garden
· 2000sqft terrace
2-yr Rental Renewal Rates for:
Oct 2008 – Jan 2009
1. Dec08: From $2100 to $3700
2. Oct08: From $2000 to $3550
Jan09: From $3500 to $4000
Dec08: From $2000 to $2300
May08: From $2000 to $2300
Percentage Rental Increase for 2-yr Renewal Tenants in 2008:
1. 76% increase
2. 78% increase
14%
15%
Previous 2-yr Rental Renewals in:
2006
1. From $1900 to $2100
2. From $1800 to $2000
From $3100 to $3500
From $1800 to $2000
Percentage Rental Increase for 2-yr Renewal Tenants in 2006:
1. 16.6%
2. 11%
13%
11%

The data above clearly shows that at a time when the Singapore Government is expounding to businesses big and small to do all they can to help their employees by looking to cost-saving measures first before facing the last resort of retrenchment; and government agencies like CAAS is taking proactive steps to provide assistance to its partner airlines; JTC, our very own government agency taking care of our residential project is deviating significantly from this stance of social and civic responsibility during this time of economic hardship. At this bleak economic window; SLA and LTA are only imposing 14-15% rental increases on their existing residential tenants; JTC on the other hand is imposing 76-80% rental increases on their existing residents at this window.
The average tenancy tenure of the residents being affected directly is 15-19 years. Some even as long as 32 years. These are people's homes we are talking about; not merely office space and office furniture.
Minister Lim, we are not asking for a charity handout. All we are seeking is for your compassionate help on the following:
For JTC to officially take receipt of our Community Petition (signed by over 190 residents) representing the majority voice of the Residents of Chip Bee Gardens. Many petitioners have taken the time to elaborate and expand in the petition on their personal appeals.
The residents had chosen the path of the petition as we felt it was the most democratic and fair to assess the majority sentiment of our community. To date, JTC has chosen NOT to acknowledge this petition.
Failing which we feel we will have no further avenue but to escalate to higher authorities and rally the support of the press and the public.
For JTC to extend the current 18-20 Dec legal deadlines being given to existing residents (those with tenancies ending Oct, Nov & Dec 2008) to sign their new tenancy agreements at the high rates indicated earlier or face legal penalties. Many affected residents had seeked JTC's support for a temporary tenancy freeze until an amicable solution could be reached with JTC on the Official Petition and Appeal we mentioned in (1). These residents were given very short notices of 7-10 days only to make this very significant life-impacting decision.
Given that a resolution is unlikely to be reached by the deadlines imposed, we seek your compassionate consideration to request JTC to allow these residents to extend the deadline till the end of January 2009 and allow these affected residents to continue paying their old rent until a solution is concluded.
In light of the depressed economic environment and the severe economic tsunami we are all going to face in 2009; suggest to JTC to either freeze any increase for at least a 1-year renewal window or to revise the rental renewal rate for existing residents by 15-20% (in line with the more moderate increases being shown by SLA and LTA above) instead of the current massive 76-80% increases being imposed by JTC on the existing residents.
· We appreciate that JTC wants to bring all the properties in Chip Bee Gardens up to prevailing market rates and as residents we are not fighting that. All we seek is for JTC to please work with the existing long-term residents and perhaps develop 2-4 year renewal plans that gradually takes the rent up to market rates. This will enable affected tenants to have sufficient time to be able to plan and absorb this additional financial burden in such a challenging economic time and/or seek alternative accomodation.
For existing tenants that are not able to financially meet even the revised and/or gradual rental rate increases seeked in (3), we request for JTC to give them at least 3 months notice at their previous rental rates to allow them adequate time to be able to find other suitable homes to move out to.
We believe the timing of JTC's decision to impose these extreme 76-80% rental renewal rate hikes and the continued failure by JTC to engage in dialogue with the residents of our community to reach an amicable solution on this matter is void of any social, civic or moral responsibilities that as citizens and permanent residents we would expect from a Singapore government agency.
Minister Lim, please help us in this matter at a time when we are all facing the worst economic recession of our lives. As a residents' community, we will want to take the right course of action to ensure the signed petitions from the majority of the Residents of Chip Bee Gardens gets a proper and compassionate hearing from the relevant authorities from the Government of Singapore. This letter was compiled as a collaborative input of the resident-representatives in the cc list.
Yours sincerely,

Residents of Chip Bee Gardens