Sustainable office spaces are here thanks to Filinvest REIT Corp

The company wins awards at the Real Estate Asia Awards 2022. 

Like other industries, real estate and properties had to cope and adjust in the past years with the global changes occurring in the ways of working. One of the trends that emerged is building and creating sustainable workspaces. Filinvest REIT Corporation (FILRT) leveraged this trend, championing sustainable office spaces as the future of responsible Philippine real estate. In doing so, it was awarded the Office Development of the Year- Philippines Award and the REIT Initiative of the Year - Philippines Award at the Real Estate Asia Awards 2022.  

The awards programme recognises major breakthroughs, innovations, and key players in the real estate industry of Asia. The awards received by FILRT are in recognition of its efforts to further the adoption, development and leasing of sustainable office spaces that focus on green design, energy efficiency and renewable energy, amongst others.  

FILRT’s property portfolio consists of 17 Grade A office buildings totalling over 300,000 square meters of gross leasable area (GLA) valued by an independent appraisal company at ₱48.5 billion. One of the key features of the FILRT portfolio is its location. Sixteen of the 17 assets or 94% of FILRT’s portfolio by valuation are located in the award-winning Filinvest City, an integrated and master-planned township in the Alabang CBD in southern Metro Manila. The remaining asset is located in Cebu, on the gateway of Cebu IT Park, a fast-growing office expansion destination outside Metro Manila.  

Within Filinvest City is Northgate Cyberzone IT Park which is one of the first PEZA-registered IT Parks in the Philippines. It features superior accessibility to major CBDs and neighbouring regions. The portfolio also has access to various supporting amenities and infrastructure. For example, the buildings have a truck-mounted mobile generator as emergency secondary backup power to the building generators.

FILRT is proud that Filinvest City is a sustainable and environment-friendly neighbourhood. Filinvest City is a LEED or Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design v4 Gold Certified for Neighborhood Development, which is the first CBD in the Philippines to earn such recognition. LEED is one of the most widely used international green building rating systems in the world that locators are looking for, making FILRT’s assets very marketable. Two of the buildings — Axis Tower One and Vector Three — are LEED Gold certified. These buildings are designed to be more energy efficient by at least 10% compared to conventional buildings.

Filinvest City integrates the use of renewable energy, with six FILRT buildings sourcing 100% from renewables. The majority of the buildings are attached to the largest district cooling system (DCS) plant in the Philippines, substantially reducing energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions by as much as 40% and saving about 11,500 tons of carbon dioxide per year. FILRT also has an environment-friendly internal transport system through Eco-Loop, the first electric-powered 24/7 public transport system in the country.

FILRT has high-quality bluechip, multinational tenants from the Philippines’ business process outsourcing (BPO) sector, providing stable cashflows. As of end-March 2022, BPO tenants made up 91% of occupied GLA. Traditional office tenants took up another 8%, and the small remainder is leased to Philippine online gaming operators and retail tenants. The top 10 tenants in the portfolio contributed about 60% of GLA including major multinational BPO companies and a global bank. FILRT has the highest BPO office tenant portfolio amongst REITs. 

The Real Estate Asia Awards 2022 is presented by Real Estate Asia. To view the full list of winners, click here. If you want to join the 2023 awards programme and be acclaimed for your company's innovative real estate developments, please contact Julie Anne Nuñez at [email protected].