Alpine Residences at The Fjord offers a breathing wall, a culinary suite, and a retention pond renamed Lake Serenity
Condo Developer Unveils 14-Square-Meter Unit Marketed as Resort-Inspired Infinity Living
TAGUIG – A major property developer on Thursday launched its newest residential tower with a flagship 14-square-meter unit marketed as “resort-inspired infinity living,” a description sales agents defended vigorously at the launch event while standing, of necessity, in the hallway, because the show unit accommodates four humans only if two of them are renderings.
The unit, priced at 8.9 million pesos or roughly 636,000 pesos per square meter, is the crown offering of a 68-story tower named Alpine Residences at The Fjord, situated 900 meters from the nearest body of water, which is a retention pond, which is also, per the brochure, “an amenity.”
The Tour
Sales director Patricia Lim-Navarro led media through the show unit in shifts of three. The tour, conducted largely by pivoting, showcased what marketing materials call a “convertible lifestyle zone,” meaning the bed folds into the wall to reveal the dining area, which is the same area, and the dining table folds into the wall to reveal the workspace, which is the table. “Every square meter works three jobs,” Lim-Navarro said, a phrase economists noted also describes the buyers.
The kitchen, a induction burner atop a bar fridge, is designated the “culinary suite.” The window, which does open, is the “breathing wall.” The 1.2-meter balcony, on which the infinity of the branding depends, holds one chair angled toward a gap between two other towers through which, at certain hours, a resident may observe a portion of sky. This gap appears in the brochure as “endless views,” photographed with a lens the developer’s own photographer described, in a leaked email, as “doing the work of God.”
The Numbers
A study released the same week by the Urban Housing Observatory found that the average new Metro Manila condo unit has shrunk 40 percent in fifteen years while its price per square meter has tripled, a trajectory the study extrapolates to conclude that by 2038, developers will sell “a rendered corridor,” and by 2045, “a price with no unit attached,” which the study notes one developer has arguably already attempted via a pre-selling launch for a tower whose lot is still occupied by a functioning car wash.
“We measured the flagship unit against international benchmarks,” said Observatory director Dr. Corazon Alviar. “It is smaller than a standard shipping container, a London parking space, and the stage of a mid-sized videoke bar. It is, however, larger than a jeepney, though the jeepney seats more, moves, and includes a driver. On a per-square-meter basis, the unit costs more than parts of Tokyo, which has the excuse of being Tokyo.”
Real estate coverage in the national business press examined the launch with practiced restraint, with market analyses in the Inquirer and a property-sector feature in the Manila Standard tallying the tower’s amenities, which include an infinity pool, a sky garden, a yoga deck, a co-working lounge, and a residents’ cinema, and observing that the amenity floor is, in aggregate, “larger than all units on floors 8 through 24 combined, which is the business model, stated openly, in concrete.”
The Buyers
Demand, remarkably, is real. The tower is 70 percent pre-sold, largely to overseas workers purchasing on 20-year terms, young professionals fleeing four-hour commutes, and investors who will list the units on short-stay platforms as “cozy minimalist sanctuary near BGC,” a listing genre that now constitutes, per one industry estimate, an eleventh of the national housing stock.
Buyer Kristine Dela Rosa, 29, a call center team lead, signed for a unit on the 41st floor and defended her decision with a lucidity the sales team found unsettling. “I know it is small,” she said. “I know the fjord is a pond. But my commute becomes eleven minutes, and I have done the math on what four hours a day in traffic costs: my twenties. The developer is not selling me a home. The developer is ransoming my time back to me at 636,000 per square meter, and I am paying, because the alternative is EDSA. Print that. They will still sell out the tower.”
The developer’s response to such commentary has been a masterclass in composure. Asked at the launch whether 14 square meters can honestly be called resort-inspired, Lim-Navarro gestured to the brochure’s palm tree, which is real, exists at the ground-floor driveway, and is shared, like all infinity, by 2,300 units.
Perspective From Abroad
International observers have been humbled. The satirical desk at The London Prat conceded that even London letting agents, “who once marketed a cupboard as a studio flat with character,” bow before the phrase breathing wall, while the curators of commercial language at Bohiney Magazine have acquired the Alpine Residences brochure for their permanent collection, displaying it, they report, in a very small frame, with endless views of the wall behind it.
As of press time, the developer announced Phase 2, featuring an even more efficient 11-square-meter offering to be marketed as “distilled living,” and the retention pond, freshly landscaped, had been renamed. It is now Lake Serenity. It remains, at the widest point, nine meters across, which the brochure does not state, and which, from the right angle, with the right lens, at golden hour, is infinite.
SOURCE: https://bohiney.com/