PROPCAFE is a fan of Bangsar South for a few obvious reasons. PROPCAFE likes its accessibility and city location, relatively new township with good infrastructures (yes DUKE 3 is coming), self-sustainable community with plenty of amenities, eateries, and entertainment, and full of professional job opportunities. We like what we see now, that’s why we cover it a lot! We guess this should be enough to solve the question marks from our followers. 😀
What’s new in Bangsar South 2021? It is the time for South Link! South Link has been vacant possessed since July 2021 and it has been well received in the rental market and even some secondary transactions. Based on our understanding, many owners obtained rental yield near to 6% and a few sub-sales transactions also hit RM960psf (fully renovated units and with tenancy). Well, if sub-sales buyers still can catch near to 4.8% rental yield, means there is really room to grow in this part of Kuala Lumpur. Are we seeing signs of recovery in the property market? In fact, we are not too sure, but selective areas may see the light at the end of the tunnel. The key is, choose the property wisely!
Building Façade
To recap, South Link comes with 1422 units of freehold apartments which have two blocks arranged as L-Shape buildings. The façade is a very typical UOA property without any surprises and for sure it is not the best-looking property. But it is a kind of evergreen design that you will not hate it either. Thanks to a number of units, it looks rather dense. However, as properties in Bangsar South are mostly built by UOA, you will get used to this sort of facade and design very quickly, and suddenly, dense or not, all look similar. 😛
Although South Link is like an L-Shape building, it is in fact U-Shape! Thanks to the South View unit which is right beside South Link. If you add in Kommune Living (Hotel), the U can turn to be rectangle shape given that all buildings are relatively close to each other! This makes choosing the right-facing becomes critical if you want to avoid facing your opposite building and laundry at the balcony all the time.
Guardhouse
The small guardhouse is sitting right in front of the South Link signage as it is a commercial building with retail elements, you can see the setting is slightly different from a residential building.
Pedestrian Access Control
It is good that there is access control of pedestrian entry gate for residents which separate from the commercial car park and access.
Commercial Element
The commercial and retails are not opened it and therefore, we are unable to get in to see it. However, from far, you can kind of expect the retail design which will be similar to other UOA commercial and office blocks in Bangsar South. The latest commercial that will open up here is the Food City which is on the ground floor of South Link. By the way, the access of South Link’s commercial is located separately from the residential side in terms of lobby access and car park area. The latest photos from PROPCAFE Buddies below showed that the commercial retail will be ready soon!
Commercial Photos – Credit Source: PROPCAFE Buddies
Commercials and Link Bridge
Along the way from commercial lots till the end, you will reach the road to Komune Living Hotel. You may notice the link bridge from South Link to South View is ready. Too bad, it doesn’t serve any purposes until the link to KL Gateway mall is up. When? Only the two developers can answer it.
Drop-off Area
After you enter from the main gate, you will be greeted by the drop-off lobby. The wide drop-off area resembles the hotel design especially its huge and high ceiling lobby inside the building.
Waiting Lounge/Lobby
However, the lounge area is EMPTY. Literally empty except for the old water features with pots 😯 . It won’t cost a lot for a large property developer like UOA to furnish the lounge nicely. Perhaps it is their DNA, they just won’t spend their budget on this area which is against the trend nowadays as most of the developers will make it grand to attract the new generation buyers. Take a look, the waiting lounge that doesn’t even come with even a bench. Shocking and what a waste! PROPCAFE really thinks that the developer seriously needs to “review” their budget allocation and include this as the key area to spend their money for their future projects.
The Good thing is, as the flooring and ceiling lighting are done properly, it is not difficult for JMB or MC to furnish it up nicely and level up the grade from B- to A- 🙂 . However, we have seen many properties “screwed up” because JMB and MC members think they are as good as ID professionals. So, advice to future JMB/MC members, the wiser choice would be to hire an ID company or furniture shop with an internal ID project team or makeover company. Good Luck!
High and Low Zone Lift and Lobby
Next, you will see residents are allocated two different lift lobbies, separated by high and low zone units. This is something that UOA has planned well to minimize the lift waiting time for residents, especially with the consideration of more than one thousand units here in South Link. The lift lobby design looks decent with a large mirror, wood grains, and stainless steel elements. However, it is a bit too “cold” and feels more toward the Grade A/B office lift lobby.
As usual, UOA provides Hitachi lifts with a maximum passenger of 23 and a load of 1565kg. PROPCAFE has to say, the speed of the lift is satisfactory as it doesn’t take long to reach the top floor (52nd floor) without any disturbs from low floor residents.
The mailroom is pretty standard which located on the ground floor.
Facility Floor
When we reached the lift lobby of the facility floor, we felt the lobby with a bit greyish and lighter color have made it a more residential environment than the ground floor.
Empty Space?!
Unfortunately, once you stepped out of the lobby, you see a typical UOA character in a common area. EMPTY spaces. Some of the spaces are actually positioned with some beautiful city scenes!
Again, JMB/MC has some immediate works to do when they take over the building from the developer. It is so ridiculous to waste these areas which can be easily put in more benches and designer outdoor furniture to make it the resting or even working spaces for residents. We would recommend developer or JMB pay a visit to recently VPed South Brooks in Desa Parkcity (PROPCAFE will share the 360-degree view soon). It has the most resting areas with benches, designer furniture ever in all properties that we have visited. Every single corner and pillar, you will see the furniture or seating area there. The developer does it for a reason, to accommodate the relatively high number of units which is necessary nowadays given work-from-home is going to be the norm in the future. South Link has all the space! It is all about how much you have in the sinking funds and how good the project team is to furnish it up for the residents. If it can be executed properly, it will certainly make a positive impact on its future valuation.
How About Green Allocation?
One effort that PROPCAFE noticed from UOA is they at least tried to add more green elements along the pathway at the facilities floor. The landscape is certainly not at the level of Seksan or other famous landscapers. Having said that, it is not too bad though it can blend better to connect it with other parts of the facility floor.
Pool Area
There are adult and wading pools on this floor. Basic sun loungers and tables are provided. Nothing more and nothing less.
The infinity pool comes with reasonable size, unfortunately, there is no view to enjoy it unless you enjoy peeping on the South View’s pool or balconies there. At least, South Link’s facilities floor is much higher than South View’s so it still has a better view than the poor South View cousin. Well, residents of South Link can at least enjoy the pool with some internal green views.
Concrete Jungle View
This is the place where you can feel the concrete jungle scene (head up to the top of the building). Building by building, personally I quite like it but others may not.
Standard changing areas and Surau rooms.
Gym Room
The gym room is quite well equipped but we are not sure it is acceptable for the density of South Link. Our bet is it should be adequate. Generally, facilities are always under-utilized in Malaysia except for holidays or buildings with many Airbnb operators.
Individual Floor/ Corridor
The corridor is rather wide as most of the areas are having 10 feet wide. No fancy wall features but the developer cleverly comes out with a smart and less costly option to paint the wall with some simple designs. It makes the corridor less dull. Not a bad decision. The dark grey color tone (together with the lift lobby) in fact helps to make it a bit cozier to the floor.
Views from the building
Managed to peek from the corridor and which can help a bit of buyers to choose their units.
To keep the privacy of our property buddies, we are not here to show the finishing of the units. Plenty of YouTubers have shared it, so please just google it. Our quick tour of the unit showed the developer’s finishing is above average. Not bad at all. This includes the kitchen cabinet, wall finishing, sliding door material, tiling, etc. But don’t expect European or Japanese brands of electronic items like the water heater, and hood & hob. Overall, buyers should be happy and have little to worry about the defect (we have seen much worse, trust us).
What do we think?
In short, this is the most compact building in Bangsar South but the developer managed to mitigate the density issue by having separate lift zones for low and high floor residents and to include more space in the building, from lobby, corridor, facilities area to car park lots. So, kudos to UOA to deliver it but the common issue on UOA properties is always the empty space and we think it is about time for UOA to hire a professional landscaper and allocate more budget to furnish the common and facilities areas. This is to follow the trend to WOW the new generation buyers or residents (tenants) to bring up the value of the property. PROPCAFE sees the commercial retail especially variety of eateries in food city and other community stores in commercial floors will continue to add more values and conveniences to residents. It is definitely a value buy in Bangsar South and with a new medical center in the plan, more jobs (i.e. more professional tenants) are coming! With more signs of own-stayers in Bangsar south and its superb location, it has everything to become one of the nice community living areas in town.
For those who missed our previous review on South Link, you can find it here:
PROPCAFE™ Review: SouthLink @ Bangsar South by UOA
Bangsar South Review:
PROPCAFE™ Review: Bangsar South @ Kuala Lumpur
The latest property in Bangsar South – Laurel Residences:
PROPCAFE Review: Laurel Residence @ Bangsar South By UOA
Happy Property Hunting! Merry X’mas and Happy New Year!
Note To SL Owners: If developer/JMB/MC managed to furnish up the space in the future, please send us the updated photos, so we can update and share them with all prospective buyers and tenants here.