CORPORATE REAL ESTATE MANAGEMENT IN SINGAPORE: A BUSINESS MANAGEMENT PERSPECTIVE

1. INTRODUCTION

Corporate real estate management (CREM) is concerned with the management of land and buildings owned by companies not primarily in the real estate business. Over the last two decades, academic interests in this subject had remained high generating strong empirical evidence of the ability of corporate real estate to enhance corporate wealth and thus firmly establishing the academic and practical significance of research in this subject.

While the CREM practices in Europe and North America is well documented in an annual survey conducted by the Corporate Real Estate Management Research Unit (CREMRU) at the University of Reading since 1993, much less is known about the same in Asia despite the increasing corporate real estate holdings by many multi-national companies (MNCs) in this region as a result of rapid economic development. As such, Part I of this paper attempts to address this void by examining the corporate real estate (CRE) practices of MNCs and listed companies in Singapore. The importance of this study is that it enhances current understanding of corporate real estate management practices and promotes best CREM practices by providing evidence from a different business environment. In addition, the study exposes current inefficiencies in Asian corporate real estate practices and thus serves as the impetus for business firms to urgently review the role of real estate in the firm and how its value can be maximized.