An off beat contact with a Walton Consultant

Its been a while since i met up with X since our university days. Back then he comes across as one of the fun ones that would rather have around given the tremendous stress of school work and all.

Since those days, programming and IS have been the furthest from his mind right now. He was working at DBS and recently he has join Walton International  Group. Walton is essentially one of a few land banking institutions that is on the look out for investors. And perhaps the most well known to me since they have the most consultants thus reaching more people so more news about what they do.

I would rather leave out the details in the next post. But what is land banking. Essentially from  Wiki,

Land banking is the practice of purchasing land with the intent to hold on to it until such a time as it is profitable to sell it on to others for more than was initially paid. Land is becoming increasingly popular as an investment due to the benefit of its being a tangible asset as opposed to Shares or Bonds. This type of investment has gained such popularity it is now possible to land bank worldwide and there are several firms set up to offer opportunities to do so.

Parcels of land desirable for “Land Banking” are those that lie directly in the growth path of rapidly developing cities. The initial goal is to buy undeveloped land that will increase in value because it lies in the path of urban growth. The key is to identify these parcels well in advance of the developers and wait for their values to mature. With diligent research, financing and managing of a land banked property, one may be able to realize a profit upon the final sale.

What are the kind of returns are you looking for?

Based on the track record of Walton, many of their land parcels have been closed with a greater to 10% yield. The yield will depend on the number of years that you have to wait for the land to be  acquired, contracted, syndicated, planned and managed or exited by Walton.

How long will normally a piece of investment gets closed?

Meaning when will you be able to cash this out. This would really depend on whether this piece of development or land gets interest from developers. It could take a short 3 years to over 10 years. That is according to the Walton brochures that i have.

I will continue posting for the subsequent days.