Building with resilience, purpose and excellence
Every edition of the PropertyGuru Philippines Property Awards provides a snapshot of where our real estate industry stands and where it may be heading.
This year’s results matter even more because they emerged from developers navigating economic pressures and wider uncertainties while answering to the evolving needs of Filipino communities.
As chairperson of the independent judging panel, I sit alongside experts in architecture, hospitality, development, investment and sustainability—a range of expertise that keeps our evaluation honest.
It’s why this year’s theme, “Defined by Excellence,” is particularly relevant. Excellence shows up in design and innovation, but also in responsible development, sustainability, genuine community fit and value that lasts beyond the ribbon-cutting.
Archipelago-wide conversation
What struck me most this year was how far excellence has spread. Philippine real estate is no longer just a Mega Manila, Mega Cebu or Mega Davao story.
Developers from Luzon, the Visayas and Mindanao proved that quality development is an archipelago-wide conversation.
Cebu Landmasters Inc.’s second Best Developer win proves that regional players can compete and win nationally. We also recognized standout projects in Metro Cebu, Davao, General Santos and Samal, alongside those in Luzon markets.
Regional developers have become serious players, mastering mixed-use developments that combine residential, commercial, office and hospitality components within a single footprint so people can live, work, shop and be entertained without a long commute—and extended that discipline into masterplanned projects across the country.
Healthy correction
For years, the industry’s yardstick was volume: Units launched, take-up rates and how fast a tower sold out at pre-selling.
That mindset fed the over-inventory now visible in some parts of Metro Manila’s residential segment. Some call it the end of the sector’s honeymoon. I’d call it a healthy correction. The projects that are still performing are the well-located, well-managed ones built for people who intend to live in them.
Housing awards have emerged stronger than before and must remain a huge part of that conversation as the country works to address its housing backlog of 6.5 million units.
This year’s Special Recognition for National Housing Development, awarded to Avesta Residences by PH1 World Developers, was a pointed reminder: Excellence is measured by how well real estate serves people and strengthens communities.
This diversity matters. As new economic and tourism centers emerge, developers can build places shaped by local lifestyles, cultures and aspirations.
For a country with exceptional natural and cultural assets, sustainable development is especially important. In tourism and hospitality, growth should create economic opportunities without hollowing out the environment or the communities hosting it.
Reason for optimism
There are real challenges ahead. But this year’s winners gave me genuine reason for optimism—proof that the industry can adapt, innovate and keep building through uncertainty, not in spite of it.
My hope is that developers carry this momentum forward by expanding responsibly, building more attainable homes and designing places with real roots in their communities.
I’d also like to see tourism development treated as core infrastructure policy—one that converts arrival growth into longer stays, improves connectivity beyond the Manila-Cebu-Davao circuit and encourages destination development in secondary provinces with the natural assets to convert visitors into investors.
Raising the bar
Fourteen years ago, an awards program helped raise that bar in our metro cities. The work now is to raise it everywhere else. A good building outlasts a launch. A good industry outlasts a cycle, and this one, I believe, is only getting started.
The author is the president of TAJARA Hospitality Group and chairperson of the judging panel of the PropertyGuru Philippines Property Awards
