[huanggua]

Thanks for sharing your well-informed insight.

I don't remember reading that Manila is the worst place to invest in the world. But I do remember reading that PI is the worst place to invest in. The problem with investing in property is that its difficult to convert your investment into cash in short time. Alot is dependent on location and point of entry. Buyers generally will not buy at market price. Market price is set by the developers and obviously it will always appreciate. People will only buy if you are selling at 20 to 30% below market price. I bought a unit at The Serendra for 6 million and sold it for 9 million when the market price set by Ayala was 12 million. I made some money though. As for financing, Banks will never finance a property which is outside the metro. Even the developers themselves will not offer in-house financing at high interest rate. The reason is simple enough. Because it's difficult to find tenants. It's a matter of ROI. You need to have the right location and you need to get in early. Getting in early is a matter of having the right connection. Because good units are snapped up before the launch. It's a very dirty game. Money is power here.

As regards the casinos. This idea was coined during Marcos's era. But it took a long time to reach this stage. The operators have been offered financing by banks own by Henry Sy. The reason why the operators have held back is because of the pending investigation by Ninoy as the contracts were granted without proper tenders. Once this investigation is over the operators will commence their construction. The project cannot failed as the Sys have already invested alot in this project.

Originally Posted by etsys

The Lord; What's new ? haha .. Old story .. as in that it is the cops who kidnap ..

huanggua:

Well, for investing in Manila, my 2 cents.

It is not for no reason that Manila is called as the worst place to invest

The banks and lending institutions have a tight fist, tighter than a hedgehog's ass..

And the businessmen, well, they are great at doing business on Other people's money

Example: LBC bank went bust, but the rest of the LBC group is happy and healthy, and happily making money with no recourse for the investors who lost their money, and the structure is nice enough that one disaster doesn't hit another - safe operations. At the cost of the poor joe public.

Lending ? well, a guy who holds a 60 million property, in Zambo, wanted to take a mortgage, on the fully paid up property for ten million peso, for some liquidity in his other business - wanna know what the banks say ? No can do. All of 'em had the same.

Either the banks don't trust the valuation or they are shit scared of lending money, which is their business in the first place ..

Oh, well, guess who owns the banks ? The Tans, the Sys, the Ayalas, and all ..

I am not a financial guy, but, well, the way the whole system runs is to do only micro lending, and stop and avoid large scale lending, unless fully backed by govt guarantees ..

Coming back to your casinos, they are fully funded by some mysterious financier - who, at the fall of the dice, will reverse all, and there goes all the bets.

I maybe wrong though.