Despite lower rental rates for office spaces in the Alabang property market compared with other central business districts, conglomerate Filinvest Development Corp. (FDC) does not see a lack of demand in the area, a company official said. 

In an interview with reporters last week, Filinvest Land, Inc. (FLI) Chief Executive Officer & FDC Board Director Josephine Gotianun-Yap said the growth in rental rates in the Alabang property market is not far behind that of other emerging business districts. 

“I think our increases are similar to theirs [QC & Bay Area]—with what’s acceptable in the market,” Gotianun-Yap said. Gotianun emphasized that the firm expects demand for its Alabang properties to grow in the future as the number of people residing in the southern part of Metro Manila continues to grow. 

“In fact, the population is also a lot in the south. Many are moving south, and in terms of the population, many are young people, so you can expect more and more demand will be coming in from the south,” Gotianun-Yap explained. 

“We’ve seen a very strong demand, that’s why you can see now our buildings are bigger, much higher because the demand has grown quite strong,” added the CEO. “Then you have to remember, once NLEX and SLEX are connected, it will be very fast to travel to Alabang from Quezon City. So the whole corridor will really change, just like what happened to the Skyway when we connected, and now with the NLEX and SLEX, that’s another major change that will impact the prices of Alabang,” Gotianun-Yap said. 

Source: The Manila Times
By:  Catherine Talavera, Reporter
*Minor corrections applied