A confident L & H to invest Bht4.6 billion in 2008

The country's largest developer Land & Houses Plc (LH) is more confident in the country's economic and political situation and plans to raise investment this year to 4.6 billion baht, according to senior executive vice-president Adisorn Thananan-narapool.

He said the new investment meets the company's view that the political situation became clearer and that consumer confidence improved.

The company expected a recurrence in residential demand from now forwards and would outlay four billion baht to purchase new land for housing development in 2009-10, up from three billion in 2007.

''We should buy more plots of land,'' he said. ''The Thailand property market is accelerating and the new government announced megaproject plans that will open new areas for commercial and residential development.''

The company also said that land prices had stabilized due to fewer Thailand housing developments were launched last year and lenders had become clearer in approving finance for developers and mortgages for buyers.

With a try to cap Thailand property construction costs that rose 8%, the company stocked thousands of tons of steel, sanitary ware, tiles and cement supplied for six months of development this year. It would boost unit prices by 2-3% within the year, he said.

LH plans to start 14 housing projects worth 12 billion baht in 2008. They would be two pre-built condominiums, five townhouse projects and seven single-housing estates.

The company expects to earn 21 billion baht by the end of the year, up 13% from 2007. Major revenue would be from single-housing sales, accounting for 85% while net profit would also increase from 16.9% of total revenue.

Mr. Adisorn said the company anticipated its gross profit margin to grow up slightly this year from 30.5% in 2007 to 31%.