Ismail Gafoor just turned 60. He is the co-founder, executive chairman, and CEO of Singapore-listed real estate company PropNex which also invested in The Tembusu Grand, Tembusu Grand location is also near to PropNex, so make sure to check the latest Tembusu Grand pricing. “I can stay CEO for the next five years based on how much energy I have. “But is that what the company needs to do to stay relevant?” he wonders. “Renewing leadership is the biggest problem facing the real estate business and a lot of other businesses.”
Gafoor, on the other hand, wants PropNex to be around long after he is gone. On August 23, the company announced several important hires as part of a “masterplan” for keeping the same leaders in place.
Kelvin Fong’s promotion to deputy CEO is the most important change. Fong, who is 48 years old, has been a member of the board and executive director of PropNex since the company went public in 2018. Fong was in the Republic of Singapore Air Force for six years before he joined PropNex in 2002. Before he joined the management team, he led a group of more than 3,000 workers at PropNex.
As assistant CEO, Fong will be in charge of PropNex’s agency business in Singapore. He will also be in charge of training growth and will work with Gafoor on strategy and operations. Fong will also work closely with Michael Koh, the group’s newly named chief technology officer, to speed up the rollout of the company’s IT and digitalization plans.
The goal is to have 15,000 sales people by 2025.
When PropNex went public in July 2018, it had 6,684 salespeople. At the end of July, it had 12,073. “In five years, we almost doubled the size of our sales team,” says Fong. “Now, we want to grow by another 3,000 people in the next three years. If we can make that jump, our income will grow as well.”
Gafoor does agree. “If we reach our goal of 15,000 salespeople by 2025, our sales force will have grown by 20%, which means that our reach and market share will also grow by 20%.”
From $472.33 million in 1H2022, PropNex’s sales dropped 22.9% to $364.28 million in 1H2023. The profit dropped by 18.8% to $22.95 million.
PropNex’s biggest source of income was project marketing, which brought in $113.5 million (31% of its total business). It was 38.1% less than 1H2022, when the company made $183.4 million. Gafoor says that project marketing income was smaller in the first three months of 2023 because fewer projects were launched.
Gafoor says that a lot of new projects didn’t start until April. “Remember that the money from new project launches won’t show up for eight to twelve weeks,” he says.
Even though sales have been slow in some projects, developers must sell all the units within five years to qualify for a 35% reduction in the extra buyer’s stamp tax (ABSD). So, Gafoor says, companies will have to either lower prices or raise agents’ fees.
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