Saturday, August 4, 2012

Seri Riana Residences @ Sri Rampai

Developer IJM is building the next series of Riana, the Seri Riana Residence which is located beside the Riana Green East. The Riana Green East, just like the original Riana Green at Tropicana PJ are all leasehold properties. However, they have done well in terms of capital appreciation despite that, owing much to the resort like concept and good maintenance of IJM properties. I have a lot of respect for IJM. They can even make a lower middle cost apartment in Sunway nice, Belvedere.


Good concept aside, Seri Riana's location is superb.  It is just beside the new Seri Rampai LRT station, in between vibrant Wangsa Maju and up-market Setiawangsa. Next to it is Carrefour and the expat-friendly Wangsa Walk shopping mall. Carrefour Wangsa Maju is the French hypermarket's most profitable store. Fairview has also located their flagship international school in this area.  


Today, IJM only launched 2 of the towers, almost 400 units on an 8 acre plot. Pretty high density it seems. But eventually, they will have at least 6 more blocks on the same 8 acres plot. 

Currently, Seri Riana only caters to the family. Unlike Riana Green which has studio units, Seri Riana only have 3 bedroom units starting from 1380sf up to almost 2000sf. The price starts from RM690k before their 3% early bird discount and if you are looking at the more family-friendly 1700sf/1900sf built-ups they are almost a million each. 


Between the 1380sf and 1700sf unit show rooms, I prefer the larger one. The living space does not seem so claustrophobic.



They have also a wet and dry kitchen and a maid's quarters.


Unfortunately, the master-bedroom has a disproportionate sized walk-in wardrobe and bathroom which is a lot of wasted space.


The other 2 rooms seem decent sized, one of them has an en-suite bathroom.



The 1380sf is an intermediate unit. It is just long, with bedrooms and kitchen tucked to the side. 



The master bedroom gives you that really cramped feeling, probably due to the built-in wardrobes which took up much of the width of the room.


The kitchen is also rather tiny but probably sufficient for a small family.

 and just like the larger units, it has a wet "asian" kitchen for that rough oily cooking style. Being long and narrow, the ID for the living and dining area incorporated a lot of glass which deceived us into believing that it is rather spacious.


So, for almost a million a piece, and being leasehold, this is a rather difficult choice. The only saving grace is probably the residential title but is this enough to warrant a buy? 

Judging from history, both previous Riana series almost doubled in their value but this was due to the blanket property boom all over the Klang Valley. Also, looking at the generous offer, with 3% rebate, DIBs, 1st 10% deposit spread over 12 months interest free and with both loan and SPA legals fees covered, I can't help but feel that the developer bundled these costs into the purchase price. The current selling price for neighbouring Riana Green East is about RM700k for a 1600sf unit and RM800k for the larger 1900sf... so, what do you think?

17 comments:

Anonymous said...

Nothing good about condo living at wangsa maju . Plus it's leasehold
They furnish it nicely but upon living in it can get quite dirty and messy
Imagine cooking at the tiny kitchen : all the room will smell
After a while the whole place will get dirty

Anonymous said...

U can fall for the developer trick if u are in hong kong where there is real shortage of lands thus they put ridiculous price on a per square feet basis ..
But here in kl developer is also embarking on this strategy - they would want to make u believe that u can only live in a small condo ur whole life
They start building even smaller units like shoebox
Do u need to buy everything they produce if the ready make houses are same or cheaper price ?
There's also cheap small terrace house at Sri rampai at around 200k

sinleong said...

i dont think you can get landed houses anywhere in KL or PJ under RM300k, even those disastrous leasehold units in sri manja, PJ are no less than 300k... maybe u r referring to the low cost flats

Anonymous said...

Well wangsa maju still has many old house single story small build up but cheap s in particular at Sri rampai where those days they bought it for cheap price
Now it's a developer gimmick of pushing prices up as they have secure these land long time ago
The next golden triangle seems to be mutiara damansara where many commercial office coming up and also some malls
This may stretch to Sungai Buloh after the train line is build although further down but even desa parkcity use to be nothing but look at it now
What do u think of landed home at mutiara , kd or even SG Buloh ?

Anonymous said...

There's also cheap small terrace house at Sri rampai at around 200k --> a small, run down and old terrace house in Sri Rampai cost you around 400K now. It was only around 200K long time ago, now 200K can only get a low cost apartment Called Rampai Court with 600sqft, 5 storey with lift but age 30 years old in Sri Rampai.

Anonymous said...

SRI RAMPAI is a LEASEHOLD property
it SUPPOSE to be cheap..hence dont be con by developer who promise u Luxury living in a slump area

Anonymous said...

i think buy the new development in sentral by mrcb. excellent location - you would know better since you work there. mall coming up. cheaper shops in brickfields. prices not in the stratosphere.

Anonymous said...

How much is the mrcb project at sentral
I think it's also in the millions unless u talking about studio unit

Anonymous said...

And surrounding areas like brick field is quite bad looking
Definitely not the good neighborhood

sinleong said...

KL central areas now looking at around RM1000psf. Unless you consider brickfields - yes there are some bad reports about safety and security here

Anonymous said...

Well many professionalS have moved from subang/sunway and puchong to Kota/mutiara damansara As it's nearer to KL and not that jam like if u see puchong it's horrible
Some also moved to desa parkcity which is further away after the toll
They don't necessarily lived in the city as there is a saying , u don't eat/work and shit/stay at same place

Anonymous said...

Sin Leong,

I am from Penang and interested to look at KL projects. Any good projects that you are looking around now? I am not a rich guy who is inly interested in projects below 800k:)

sinleong said...

I am in KL and looking for projects in Penang... haha.. the other way around.

I am now looking around for good sub-sale landed deals... anything over 10years that needs a good renovation, in locations such as PJ, Setiawangsa and Subang Jaya. if they are really run down, the owners are more willing to negotiate and there are quite a few that are below market rate.

Anonymous said...

Sin Leong, I see. Are you sure youa re looking for projects in Penang? Rental income in Penang not that attractive compare to KL unless you are mainly targetting at capital appreciation, then you can expand your search from PJ, Setiawangsa and Subang Jaya to Penang:)

Why not looking at condos anymore, too expensive and you see good deals on landed now?

sinleong said...

condos are well over-priced and speculative. for example, have you noticed that all new condo launches are priced higher than existing sub-sale? not to say that landed properties are not. it happens less with landed because of limited land for new builds to make any comparisons.

Anonymous said...

Hi Sin Leong,

What is the good price at Subang? I came across a 2storey terrace corner unit being auctioned for about 570k, haven't seen the condition yet. Can be a good deal?

sinleong said...

if the size is at least 22x70 and in good part of usj, try to close below RM600k. or else it might be more worthwhile to buy non-auction units