PROJECT WILL MAKE MCIA A TOURISM HUB

More tourists are expected to come here should a 5-hectare lot within the Mactan Cebu International Airport (MCIA) complex is bid out and eventually turned into a mixed-use development.

Hembler Mendoza, Lapu-Lapu City tourism chief, said that he would be expecting MCIA to become a tourism hub once this would happen.

“More direct flights will come here. Instead of going to Manila and then going to Cebu, tourists will come to Cebu directly,” Mendoza said in a recent phone interview.

5-hectare property

Mendoza was referring to the 5-hectare property within the MCIA complex which GMR Megawide Airport Corp. (GMCAC) was intending to bid out to private developers in the next two months.

GMCAC started talks with foreign and local investors last April and just recently, the SM and Ayala groups as well as a Las Vegas-based developer had expressed interest to bid for the property.

Louie Ferrer, GMCAC president, said in an earlier statement that the mixed-use development would possibly include hotels, mall complex, and a casino.

The mixed-use development will be built right across the second terminal of MCIA, both of which are expected to be completed by late 2018.

Ferrer said that GMCAC aims to ensure that traveling through MCIA is a leisurely experience for both passengers and visitors through a wide range of activities, F&B (food and beverage) and retail offerings within the airport complex.

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Source: Cebu Daily News

To attract investors, Mandaue bares incentives

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MANDAUE City may be the sixth smallest city in the country, but local stakeholders believe it has room to accommodate future investors amid an already bustling trade and industy.

Pitching to the delegates of the Australia-New Zealand Chamber of Commerce Philippines (ANZCHAM) last week for the first Mandaue Investment Forum, the City’s chief executive secretary, lawyer Elaine Bathan, said Mandaue wants to attract investors involved manufacturing of modular housing components, creative industries, knowledge-based services, passenger or intermode terminals, disaster prevention and mitigation, as well as clean water and renewable energy projects.

“The City’s new investment code (2015) clearly outlines its vision in terms of preferred investment areas. While we have studied national databases to identify a list of investment opportunities based on national growth, our eyes are set on the future and the transformation of the business environment to a highly innovative one,” the City Government said in a briefing.

Tax breaks

To encourage investors, Bathan said the City’s local investments code provides incentives to these economic activities, such as one-year tax holidays for investments of at least P3 million, excluding land; expense incentives to manufacturing companies installing quality management systems like ISO Certification and Good Manufacturing Practices (GMP); and green building incentive of five to 25 percent discount on the real property tax on buildings that are BERDE-certified.

While there are some measures implemented to entice investors in Mandaue, the business sector’s pressing concern is the scarcity of land to do business or expand in the city.

Mandaue City has a land area of 30.64 square kilometers.

Concerns were raised that industrial businesses have expanded in other parts of Cebu instead of settling in Mandaue, despite the attractive incentives that the City has to offer.

“While we admit that size may limit us, there are works for additional reclamation projects. The moment we are able to push through and expand reclamation projects, we could create economic processing zones,” Bathan said.

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Source: Sunstar Cebu 

Uniting the Strongest Foundations at PHILBEX 2016

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Rallying behind the importance of unity in its pursuit of national progress, PHILBEX Cebu 2016 assumes the theme of “Uniting Strong Foundations” as it gathers the best and most influential players of the region’s construction and design industry in an all-inclusive trade exhibition. The highly anticipated event is slated to happen on September 15 to 18, from 10AM to 8PM at the SM City Cebu Trade Hall.

Hailed as the furniture capital of the Philippines, Cebu not only accounts for a significant percentage of the Philippine exports but also for bringing much pride and honor to the country for its distinct design ingenuity which continuously garners the respect and recognition of the international design scene. In line with this, taking center stage at this year’s PHILBEX Cebu are the Interior Designer’s Gallery and Architect’s Gallery which aims to promote the distinct and unique facets of the region’s design industry by featuring personalities that have collectively contributed to the development of Cebu’s construction and design industry.

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Source: Cebu Daily News

THE PLACE THAT PUT THE PHILIPPINES ON THE WORLD MAP

Mactan Island shoreline,Cebu,Philippines

Tweet In the past, the city of Lapu-Lapu was known as the place where local chieftain - the city’s namesake, Lapu-Lapu—defeated and killed Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan, putting on hold Spain’s ambition to colonize the Philippine islands for another 40 or so years. 

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Today, the city is known for quite different reasons. Although much of the natural beauty of Mactan Island, where Lapu-Lapu City is located, has been retained over the centuries, it looks that the place is looking very optimistically into the future.

Lamudi Philippines has put together five reasons Lapu-Lapu City is the next business and tourism hot spot in Cebu province and the Central Visayas region, and the exciting future that awaits the city.Today, the city is known for quite different reasons. 

It is home to the country’s second-busiest airport

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For years the Mactan-Cebu International Airport, which is under the jurisdiction of Lapu-Lapu City, has been Central Visayas’s gateway to the rest of the Philippines. However, this airport, which handled 7.78 million passengers in 2015, is also fast becoming Cebu’s gateway to the rest of the world.

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Regular scheduled flights operate from the Mactan airport to other major cities in Asia, such as Kuala Lumpur, Hong Kong, Singapore, Seoul and Dubai. But just recently, flag carrier Philippine Airlines has started operating daily nonstop flights from the airport to Los Angeles, a testament to Lapu-Lapu City’s, and indeed, the rest of Cebu province’s position as a favorite Philippine destination by foreign visitors.

To keep up with increasing passenger number, the Mactan airport is currently undergoing a major upgrade. Construction of the airport’s Terminal 2 is on track for a June 2018 delivery, according to GMR-Megawide Cebu Airport Corp. in an article published in SunStar Cebu. The new terminal will serve all the airport’s international flights and will have an area of about 45,000 square meter, which can be expanded further in a succeeding development phase. The old terminal, meanwhile, is currently being refurbished and will eventually handle all domestic flights.

It is Central Visayas’s major tourism driver

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An article published in The Freeman cited data from the Department of Tourism (DOT), which showed that tourist arrivals in Central Visayas reached 3.5 million for the first 10 months of 2015. According to the DOT, Cebu province, as a whole, accounted for 64 percent and 84 percent of total domestic and foreign arrivals, respectively, to Central Visayas. This amounts to approximately 2.5 million tourists during the 10-month period. In addition, Lapu-Lapu City lodged majority of foreign tourists to the province, while Cebu City registered most of local visitors.

So what makes Lapu-Lapu City popular to tourists? According to Hembler Mendoza, the city’s chief tourism officer, aside from an international airport, Lapu-Lapu City is also home to at least 11 marine sanctuaries, bird and other wildlife sanctuaries, white-sand beaches, high-end hotels and resorts, and world-class dive sites. The city also offers leisure attractions not found in other parts of Cebu province, such as sunrise tours aboard a yacht and flight adventures, not to mention that there are 79 hospitality establishments in the city (and one on Olango Island) offering approximately 5,000 room inventories.

Its competitiveness ranking is improving

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Lapu-Lapu is also the only highly urbanized city in Cebu province whose competitiveness ranking has improved, according to the National Competitiveness Council (NCC). From the 23rd place in 2015, Lapu-Lapu City moved up to the 21st spot among all highly urbanized cities in the Philippines, while its overall ranking when all Philippine cities are considered surged to 39th in 2016 from the 70th position in 2015.

According to the NCC, the categories in which Lapu-Lapu City excels include presence of investment promotions unit, availability of utilities and compliance to national directives to local government units.

It has a buoyant local economy

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Where else in Cebu province will you find a diverse range of businesses, where business-process outsourcing (BPO) offices sit close to high-end hotels and beach resorts? Lapu-Lapu City offers these. In fact, the city government reported in 2015 that the number of business establishments in the city surged to approximately 12,000 in 2014, compared to about 7,000 logged in 2010, according to a report published in The Freeman.

In addition, the local government reported that the city’s revenue surged 50 percent to P1.4 billion, from P927 million in 2010. Lapu-Lapu City’s mayor was quoted as saying: “The sharp rise, she said, is the result of the taxes paid by companies doing business in the city because of its rosy economic prospects.”

It has an impeccable transport infrastructure.

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Aside from the Mactan airport, road travel within Lapu-Lapu City and the whole Mactan Island is quick and easy. Major thoroughfares encircle the entire periphery of island, while it is also connected to Mandaue in mainland Cebu via two bridges: Osmeña Bridge and Marcelo Fernan Bridge. And to ease traffic congestion on these two bridges, especially during rush hour, a third bridge is now being proposed, this time will connect the town of Cordova south of Lapu-Lapu City to Cebu City on the mainland.

The city is also much less prone to flooding during the monsoon season compared to Cebu and Mandaue. In fact, heavy rains brought about Habagat (southwest monsoon) in July of this year caused major floods of up to 2 feet in Cebu City’s busiest areas, but Lapu-Lapu City was virtually unaffected.

It is one of the most-searched locations in Lamudi

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Data from Lamudi Philippines shows that Lapu-Lapu City is one of the most searched locations for properties in the Central Visayas region (and second to Cebu City, which has more inventory and higher population base). But what’s noteworthy is that combined search volumes for houses and condos (both for sale and for rent) for Lapu-Lapu City increased 21 percent from the first quarter to the second quarter of 2016. In addition, looking at compound average growth rate (CAGR) using search data from the first six months of 2016, condos for sale and condos for rent have the highest growth rate in search volume, at 9.69 percent and 10.91 percent, respectively.

What the future holds

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Indeed, Lapu-Lapu is a city that, while deeply rooted to its past, is looking positively into the future. Its population grew an average 2.94 percent from 2010 to 2015, according to data from the Philippine Statistical Authority, and now stands at 408,112, according to the 2015 census. This growth may in part be attributed to the city’s remarkable economic performance. Over the next few years, the city will see the opening of BPO offices, mixed-use townships and resort-oriented developments, which will bring in more employment opportunities to the citizens of Lapu-Lapu City. And these developments are even more visible in the city’s Punta Engaño section and neighboring areas, a peninsula jutting out from Mactan Island’s northeastern corner. This area is where many of the city’s most upscale resorts and developments are located, including Discovery Bay Resorts and Residences, Shangri-La’s Mactan Resort and Spa, Mövenpick Hotel and Megaworld Corp.’s Mactan Newtown.

These new developments are, perhaps, one reason many consider relocating to Lapu-Lapu City, as shown by data from Lamudi for the first six months of 2016. Most of searches for Lapu-Lapu properties are not coming from Lapu-Lapu itself, but from other places. Data from Lamudi shows that 35 percent of search volume for Lapu-Lapu properties originated from neighboring Cebu City, while 8.2 percent and 5.5 percent of searches came from Quezon City and Makati City, respectively. In addition, and although still small, 1.24 percent, 1.02 percent and 0.88 percent of the total search volume for Lapu-Lapu City originated from online property-hunters based in Dubai, Singapore and Sydney, respectively.

This shows that real estate in Lapu-Lapu, particularly houses and condos, are becoming popular not only among Cebu-based property-hunters but also among those based in Metro Manila and in other countries. Whether this will continue into the future remains to be seen, but highly likely, given how progressive Lapu-Lapu City is becoming.

Source: BusinessMirror

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Condotel units to add more rooms for tourists

Tambuli Seaside Residences, Mactan Island, Cebu

Cebu will have at least 300 more rooms for tourists when the condominium project in Mactan will be completed in the next few years.

These developed with the interest of most owners of the nearly 500 condominium units of Tambuli Seaside Living projects in Barangay Mactan.

Gerard Tan, Tytans Properties and Development, Inc. president, said almost 80 percent of unit owners in their multi-billion Tambuli Seaside Living project have expressed interest to participate in a condotel concept for their condo units.

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“Many of the unit owners live outside the country. Most of them also bought units for investment purposes and are more interested in income from leasing,” said Tan.

Under the condotel concept, unit owners let the developers manage their property and market it for leasing.

Instead of having it leased monthly, Tan said, they would lease it on a daily basis to cater to transient tourists just like a hotel.

Property management will be handled by a London-based consultancy firm while the developer’s in-house staff will handle hotel management.

One factor that has attracted buyers is the high hotel occupancy rates in Mactan Island all year round, said Tan.

He said income from leasing their units would offset the homeowners’ monthly dues.

Tytans Properties topped off towers A and B with 256 units yesterday as well as broke ground for tower C which has 196 units.

According to HRRAC in a March 30, 2016 report, Cebu has at least 7,000 four star and five star accommodations.

However, the number could reach 10,000 rooms with lower star ratings and other accommodations are considered.

Tambuli Seaside Living, rising on an 11,000-square-meter property which used to host Tambuli Beach Resort in Barangay Buyong, Lapu-Lapu City, is a six-tower mixed-use development with a 200-meter beach front.

It will feature a 5,000-sq.-m. clubhouse, pool and other amenities such as a strip mall.

Tan said the six towers comprise phase one of the development, totaling 1,200 units. He added that they have a “masterplan” for phase two, which will have five towers, but no have no intention to carry it out yet.

He said that around 85 percent of unit owners are locals, most of whom have relatives abroad who convinced them to buy, while the rest are overseas Filipino workers or foreigners based in Hongkong, Singapore, Japan, Australia, and the USA.

Tan said units in towers A and B are set to be turned over by the second quarter of 2017. Units in both towers have been sold out while 93 percent of the units in tower C have been sold.

Montano Ty, Titans Properties chairman, said they plan to roll out the condotel program in the last quarter of next year.

“That is the earliest. We still have turnovers before that. If we are not ready, that’s going to be really bad for us,” he said.

When Tytans introduced Tambuli Seaside Living to the public in 2014, Ty said they were poised to become an investment destination, a second home, and a retirement place.

With powdery white sand and pristine blue waters fronting the property, Ty said they already have an advantage over their competitors.

Tytans Properties will be promoting their project at the 2016 Fiesta in America to be held in New Jersey, USA from August 13 to 14.

Read more: http://cebudailynews.inquirer.net/98642/condotel-units-to-add-more-rooms-for-tourists#ixzz4JIjrVfB3 

Source

Cebu Daily News: