Sime Darby Property to start D3 homes project in third quarter

KUALA LUMPUR: Sime Darby Property Bhd, which is on track to achieve its RM2.5 billion sales target, will kick start its first Divergent Dwelling Design (D3) sustainable homes project in the third quarter of this year.
Named Harmoni 1, the D3 pilot project will be located in Elmina West at the City of Elmina, Shah Alam, and will be the developer’s first statutory affordable housing project to adopt the D3 concept.
The project comprises 562 apartment units sized between 900 sq ft and 1,000 sq ft, complemented by shop office units with a total gross development value of RM155 million.
Sime Darby Property managing director Datuk Jauhari Hamidi said the homes are priced at RM200,000 for 900 sq ft and RM250,000 for 1,000 sq ft, and will be available to buyers registered with Selangor Housing & Property Board.
The D3 concept involves prefabrication and mass production of components for residential units that enables cost savings, higher product quality, reduction of on-site labour and minimised wastage. The concept reduces construction time from 36-42 months to 24-30 months, which is 28-33% faster than conventional methods.
“The Industrialised Building System (IBS) is a construction methodology. D3 will also be using IBS components in the construction but D3 is more holistic. It is looking at not just construction methodology, but also the design,” Jauhari said at the signing of an agreement with Construction Research Institute of Malaysia (CREAM) yesterday.
He said a conventional method of constructing affordable homes may have 25-30% IBS component but the D3 concept has 50-75% IBS component.
“This is a new concept. We have not even built it yet. We are building a prototype, it will be ready by the middle of this year and, if everything works out, the first of this unit will be constructed towards the end of the year,” he added.
The prototype gallery will be built at the Elmina West township, featuring two affordable home show units that will be completed by mid-2017.
D3 presents a scientific plan which maximises usable space, provides distinctive zones for effective space planning, allocation of areas for urban farming to promote sustainability and optimises natural ventilation.
“We will start off with affordable homes, with the intention that if this works well, we will extend it to our other open market products,” said Jauhari.
Sime Darby Property has built 8,000 affordable homes over the last 10 years and is building up to 2,000 more units this financial year ending June 30, 2017 (FY17) in its townships including Putra Heights, Bukit Jelutong and Bandar Bukit Raja.
Yesterday, the company signed a memorandum of agreement with CREAM with the aim to commercialise the D3 concept to improve affordable housing.
CREAM chairman Tan Sri Dr Ahmad Tajuddin Ali said the current agreement with Sime Darby Property has an exclusivity clause but hopes that the developer will agree to allow other developers to use the D3 concept.