White Elephant Farming In Subic

Comment from a reader on your post "The Next Wave Of Subic Investors":

I was surprised and happy to see the large rusting hotel(?) frame, with matching crane, finally coming down on Waterfront Road in the Freeport. At least I think it is coming down; the crane is gone. I believe the Legenda Hotel started the project in the late 90's just before the peso crash.

It was always amazing to me that the SBMA would allow such an obvious eye sore to rot away for so long in their "world class" Freeport.

Does anyone know why it is coming down now?

[The Subic Bulletin] The problem with the "system" inside the Freeport is that leasing properties out on the basis of "who you know" got the Freeport off to a bad start. Many of the properties were hoarded because they were obtained at low rent value just waiting to see how they could make a huge profit out of a legitimate investor.

But the pendulum eventually swung and they started leasing properties out to who could make the biggest promises, then get stuck in litigation cases when the investor doesn't keep his inflated promise.

So although many investors have done well in Subic there is no doubt SBMA has been quite proficient in "white elephant farming".