Leaders
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Kain Sim: A Leading Player Reshaping Singapore's Real Estate Industry
Kain Sim
Co-Founder & Chairman, Zacd group
It is expected that the Singaporean real estate market would grow at a CAGR of more than 3.2 percent (2022-2027). International investors can feel safe investing in Singapore's real estate market as property values appear to be rising consistently. The Singapore real estate industry saw growth in 2021 despite under the pressure of COVID-19. According to URA, Singapore, there were 28,734 non-landed residential transactions totaling USD $2 billion in 2021. This was a 57 percent improvement from 2020 with 18,295 total transactions. There were 12,574 new sale and 15,677 resale homes. Throughout the third quarter of 2021, the Singaporean real estate market was dominated by mass market properties, with the Outside Central Region (OCR) being home to nine out of ten of the top-selling projects. This was primarily caused by consumers' inclination for bigger housing units as a result of long-standing work-from-home arrangements.
A clear indicator of the market resilience is that of the private real estate market in Singapore showing a consistent gain over the previous 1.5 years. Although the rate of increase in real estate prices is projected to slow down with transaction volumes set to decline, it is nevertheless anticipated to continue its positive trajectory. There were a total of 5,389 units in 41 brand-new private residential developments in 2022, with 22 percent are in the Core Central Region, 37 percent in the Rest of Central Region (RCR), and 41 percent in the Outside Central Region. The ZACD Group is a leading player in the local development industry. Led by the dynamic Kain Sim, Co-Founder and Chairman, ZACD Group, founded in 2005 has been pioneering the constant evolution of the Singaporean real estate industry. Women Entrepreneur magazine recently engaged in one on one interaction with Kain Sim, here’s the snippet from the interview.
What are some important features about your expertise as a leader in real estate?
I had at the start of my real estate career being involved and trained in international investment sales specializing in Australian and London residential and commercial real estate. I was the head of Colliers International’s foreign markets section, where I focused on capital market sales and produced a fiveyear revenue generation of SGD $1 billion focussing on Asian companies acquiring commercial real estate in Australia.
With this investment sales background, I pioneered the concept of strata industrial property as an investment product, at a time back in 2001 when it was mostly sold to owner occupier. SLP International Property Consultants, which was the first stage in the creation of ZACD, was co-founded by my husband and me, with the vision of becoming the No. 1 industrial project marketing agency in Singapore.
With the success of SLP International pioneering industrial property as a viable investment product, we founded ZACD Investments in 2005, where we were subsequently invited by developers to become joint venture partners in industrial and residential developments and transformed us into a real estate developer.
These partners were attracted by our market insights through our property agency SLP International where we were able to create sought after real estate investment products and also created a group investors, who followed us through our subsequent development projects.
Take us through your early educational journey and prior industry experience.
I studied accountancy in the UK and have worked both in accounting and marketing field prior to my career back in Singapore on real estate. The early part of my real estate career were in international investment property mainly in Australia major cities and London. As I was honed in the international investment property mindset, I have transformed the marketing of Singapore strata industrial units from owner occupier buy to that of an investment product. Stanley Yeo is a veteran in Industrial property design and development and being conversant with end user requirements, he was always able to develop new design features that meet market demand.
What led to you co-found ZACD Group? Tell us about the underlying idea behind the firm and its unique features.
The name ZACD was initially founded as an investment company for the wealth creation of our family office which makes up the names of my two sons, Zachary and Darius.
When many of our investors, who had earlier bought investment properties through SLP International, saw our wealth creation model, they asked to joined us in the opportunity to invest at real estate developer level. As a result, our SME buyers of the end products, started to join us in investing at the development fund level. That started our launch pad as a fund manager specializing in real estate investments, where investors are able to invest in residential and industrial projects pretty much like a developer and thus reap the level of returns of a real estate developer.
Our track records include pioneering the first 30 years leasehold industrial development where we invested $165,000 and reaped over $700,000 in just 2 years. We were also responsible for developing one of Singapore largest industrial ramp up factories, North Star and was able to sell out all 700 units of strata factories in less than 2 years, and achieving an ROI of over 1000 percent. This means that for every $1mil in investment, we earned over $10mil.
Even in the midst of the Global Financial Crisis in late 2008, we are able to successfully launch and sold the potential of the Natura Loft, a DBSS project, with an IRR of 11 percent to our investor. As a result of our ability to achieving positive returns even during the financial crisis, we attracted a slew of new investors from Indonesia and China. It was on the back of this momentum that we obtained the CMS Fund Management License (CMS) from the Monetary Authority of Singapore in 2016. This marks the beginning of the transformation of ZACD, which was listed on the HKEX in January 2018. The underlying concept of the ZACD real estate fund was to provide a platform to allow accredited investor to invest from only $200k upwards, and can enjoy the same return like a developer.
Also the firm provide transparency whereby the fund invested is only designated for a particular project and profit will be distributed upon completion of the project usually 2-5 years.
Being a veteran in the Singapore real estate scene, ZACD is able to find opportunity in various market conditions. The firm is well known for its fast turnaround and completion of projects, through which an investor is able to benefit from the firm’s expertise in the ability to
• Fast track the development phase
• Prudent and strong financial management which allows us to quickly return capital to our investors.
With ZACD’s 17 years of track record, we are consistently able to attract big industry players, who are keen to joint-venture with us, the synergy which allowed us to open up greater investment opportunities. ZACD Group comprises of ZACD Capital, for fund raising and fund management, of which we managed a fund size of over $318mil. In addition to this ZACD capital also manages several family offices, which was the main growth sector for us over the last 2 years. ZACD International is the consultancy arm of ZACD group where we provide advisory to our joint venture partners to jointly pitch and share development opportunities.
What are the various responsibilities you shoulder as the Co-Founder & Group Chairman at ZACD Group? Throw light on some of the most critical challenges you face. What steps do you take to overcome these roadblocks?
I am involved in the strategic development and expansion of ZACD Group in the region. My on going focus is also to build up a strong management team and continue to attract talents to the business, so as to build our legacy and succession plans.
In any business cycle there are often many challenges such as changes in the economy, and more often than not, crisis situations of unforeseen circumstances. Navigating the business through various economic cycles has taught me how to predict and prepare for challenging times ahead and to build the necessary resilience against any potential business downturn.
What are some of the most significant milestones that you have achieved throughout your professional journey? What has been the driving force behind your success as a professional?
Some of the milestones are as follows:
• Taking a Singapore home grown enterprise to be listed on the HK stock exchange in Jan 2018.
• Attainment of the CMS Licence from MAS in 2016.
• Transiting from industrial developments to residential and now luxury condominium developments.
• Growing the company regionally, with ZACD owning hotels and commercial investment in Australia, and is constantly expanding its acquisitions and portfolio.
• We embarked and led on larger scale private residential projects like the 40 Storey luxury condominium in the city area known as the Landmark which was launch in Q4 2020 and is already under construction with TOP Expected in a little under 3 years.
• To date, the ZACD Group has $433mil of accumulated Assets Under Management. Also underway are a high end boutique residential project on Mount Emily Hill, located just off the backgate of the Istana, a purpose-built 10-Storey freehold Food Factory in Mandai that is fully sold, and a new land acquisition on a freehold residential site located just 75metres from the upcoming Katong Park MRT on the East Coast of Singapore. We have also coinvested in an Executive Condominium project in Bukit Batok West Ave 8 with Qingjian, due to be launched in the end of 2023.
The constant driving force has that been authenticity. There has to be a longer term legacy that we want to leave behind, things that we would want to be remembered for.
How do you foresee the global communications landscape evolving in the near future? Which industry trends will create the greatest impact in the said market?
This is fast becoming a society that is measuring the speed of communication in number of seconds, as opposed to hours or days in the past. As with the book “The World is Flat” by Thomas Friedman, the world is fast becoming a global village, where entrenched customs may be challenged and the status quo changed in an instant. The democratisation of knowledge has also led to a skill-centric economy, as opposed to academic centric. The fact that 99 percent of the developed world is already online will create this global village that has been postulated about and this will likely set the stage for many life-changing technologies in the fields of Medicine, Space and Transportation. My sense that women will be a very integral part of this life-changing force.
“We are at a new epoch and women can finally say that we are a full complement of men in the world of business and entrepreneurship”
Drawing from your experience, what would your advice be to young women and girls who also aspire to become business leaders and entrepreneurs in the future?
In this modern day and age, the physical advantages of our male counterparts are becoming less evident in the field of business and society. From early hunter gatherers where strength and physique are the sole determinant of success, we have evolved into a society where intellectual and other abilities like Emotional Quotient and Intuition, have placed women in a favourable position to compete. I foresee a future where women, with their natural tendencies towards attention to detail and sensitivity to nuances will increasingly lead to women out-performing boys first in the classroom and later on in board rooms all over the world. We are at a new epoch and women can finally say that we are a full complement of men in the world of business and entrepreneurship.
Kain Sim, Co-Founder & Chairman, Zacd Group
Co-founding and serving as board chairman for the zacd group, ms. Kain sim has taken a proactive role in the strategic management, marketing, and operational aspects of the business. Coming from an investment sales background, she transacted over sgd 1 billion in sales in the five years as the head of foreign markets at colliers international, before starting her own company. Bringing with her a strong track record of more than 20 years of experience in the field of international real estate, she took the company public in 2018 and to date, the zacd group has s$433 mil of accumulated assets under management.