Kasara

Overview & Key Facts

Kasara, The Lake is an enclave of just 13 private waterfront villas set within Singapore’s most exclusive residential precinct, Sentosa Cove, on Ocean Drive in District 4 (CCR). Developed by Lakefront Pte Ltd — the Singapore vehicle of YTL Land, the property arm of Malaysia’s YTL Corporation — Kasara was launched in late December 2009 and sold out within three months, a testament to the extraordinary depth of UHNWI demand at the time. The name “Kasara” is derived from the Sanskrit kassraah, meaning “lake” — a deliberate choice reflecting the project’s defining physical feature: each villa fronts a glimmering internal lake with views across the water to the world-class Serapong Golf Course, making Kasara the only residential property in Sentosa Cove with this particular vista. Designed by DP Architects, the 13 villas unfold like origami over the lake’s edge, with double-storey privacy screens, open courtyards, koi ponds, and timber decks cantilevered directly over the water. Villa sizes range from approximately 9,042 to 15,070 sqft of land area and 10,139 to 17,362 sqft of built-up area, with five-bedroom configurations, Arclinea gourmet kitchens, Miele appliances, and Poliform wardrobes throughout. Original launch prices ranged from S$14.4 million to S$25.9 million per villa.

The transaction profile at Kasara is, by necessity, ultra-thin: a single sales caveat on record at S$14.85 million, and just three rental transactions averaging S$30,333 per month (median S$25,000). This is not a product with conventional price-discovery — each transaction is a private negotiation between UHNWI counterparties, and the dataset reflects the structural illiquidity of 13-unit boutique villa ownership rather than any market weakness. At S$14.85 million, the single recorded sale positions Kasara among the highest per-unit-price residential transactions in Sentosa Cove, consistent with the villa-scale land areas and the unique lake-golf-course frontage.

Location & Connectivity

Kasara sits on Ocean Drive, the prestige spine of Sentosa Cove’s waterfront landed enclave, surrounded on three sides by the internal lake and the Serapong Golf Course. The setting is as serene as Singapore residential real estate gets: no through traffic, lush tropical landscaping, the sound of water rather than road noise, and an unbroken green vista across the lake toward the fairways. This is, by design, an island-within-an-island — the Sentosa Cove enclave itself sits on the north-eastern tip of Sentosa Island, connected to the Singapore mainland via Sentosa Gateway and accessible via the Sentosa Express monorail (VivoCity station to Beach/Waterfront station). Kasara is one of the deepest addresses within that enclave, meaning residents navigate one additional layer of resort-paced internal road to reach the Cove’s own perimeter.

Once the car-dependence is accepted as a feature rather than a bug, the location delivers an extraordinary lifestyle package. ONE°15 Marina Club — one of Asia’s premier yacht clubs, with berthing, a clubhouse, restaurants, a spa, and a regular regatta calendar — is a short internal drive from Kasara and sits at the social heart of the Sentosa Cove community. Sentosa Golf Club (home of the SMBC Singapore Open, two 18-hole championship layouts including Serapong) is effectively on Kasara’s doorstep — the lake-facing villas look directly across at the Serapong course. Capella Singapore, rated among Southeast Asia’s finest luxury hotels, is a five-minute drive and its restaurants and spa are accessible to residents. Resorts World Sentosa — Universal Studios Singapore, S.E.A. Aquarium, Hard Rock Hotel, the casino — is barely ten minutes away by internal road. VivoCity (Singapore’s largest shopping mall, anchored by NTUC FairPrice Finest and Cold Storage) is the primary retail and grocery hub, reachable in approximately ten minutes via Sentosa Gateway. The CBD and Raffles Place are roughly 20–25 minutes by car under normal conditions; Changi Airport approximately 30–35 minutes.

For residents with a vessel, Kasara’s proximity to ONE°15 Marina opens direct water-borne access to the Southern Islands, anchor spots off Lazarus Island, and short passages to the Riau Islands of Indonesia — a weekend itinerary simply not available from any mainland Singapore address. The island’s internal bus network and Sentosa Express monorail provide commuter-light connectivity, but service frequencies and coverage are designed for tourist circulation, not daily residential commuting. In practice, every Kasara resident should budget for private vehicle or chauffeur transport as a fixed lifestyle cost.

Facilities

Kasara is not a condo with communal facilities — it is 13 private detached villas, each a fully self-contained estate. The defining amenity is within each unit: a private swimming pool with a timber deck cantilevered directly over the internal lake, providing an experience of swimming over water with an unobstructed view to the Serapong Golf Course beyond. Each villa is configured across multiple storeys with an Arclinea gourmet kitchen, Miele appliances, Poliform wardrobes, integrated koi ponds and open courtyards, living and dining halls designed to blur the boundary between indoors and outdoors, and master suites with panoramic lake-facing balconies. Car parking is provided within a sheltered car porch plus driveway. The five-bedroom-plus layout (some units run to additional bedrooms for live-in domestic staff) gives each villa the footprint of a very large landed home rather than a high-rise penthouse.

Shared estate facilities are minimal by design — private luxury, not communal club infrastructure, is the product. The ONE°15 Marina Club effectively serves as Kasara’s extended facilities deck: clubhouse dining, rooftop pool, fitness centre, spa, and the full sailing and social calendar of one of Asia’s leading yacht clubs are all a short drive from the villa’s car porch. The Sentosa Cove Quayside Isle waterfront strip — home to Il Lido Italian Beach Club, Sabio by the Sea, and other fine-dining and casual venues — provides dining and social infrastructure within the immediate neighbourhood. Maintenance fees for a 13-villa boutique estate are inherently very high in per-unit terms but represent a modest fraction of the villa’s capital value.

“Kasara is the most intimate address in Sentosa Cove. Thirteen villas, each with its own lake, its own pool cantilevered over the water. You wake up to the sound of the lake and the view of the golf course. It feels like a resort that only thirteen families share.”

— Sentosa Cove resident on Kasara’s ultra-boutique character, via YTL Land portfolio

The rental data — three transactions averaging S$30,333 per month (median S$25,000, with at least one corporate-rate let approaching S$36,000+ per month) — speaks to the profile of the occupant pool. These are C-suite executives, senior diplomats, and ultra-HNWI family groups on corporate leases or sabbatical arrangements, for whom the S$25,000–36,000 monthly rental is a minor line item against a relocation package or investment return. The extraordinary scale and finish of each villa — 10,000 to 17,000 sqft of built-up area with a private lake-facing pool — is simply not replicable at this price point anywhere else in Singapore. At the ultra-luxury end, Kasara competes less with other Singapore residential rentals and more with five-star serviced villa options across the region.

Pricing & Market Position

Based on 1 recorded transactions, sale prices range from $14,850,000 to $14,850,000, averaging $14,850,000.

Rents range from $21,000 to $45,000 per month across 3 rental transactions. Current rental yield sits at approximately 2.0%.

Neighbourhood Comparison

Within Sentosa Cove, the landed villa tier encompasses a handful of ultra-boutique estates, of which Kasara is the most distinctive by virtue of its lakeside and golf-course orientation. The Villas @ Sentosa Cove (Sandy Island, also by YTL Land) is the direct sibling development: another 18-unit boutique of private waterfront villas, also 99-year leasehold, also fronting the marina channel and with private boat berths. Sandy Island offers direct water access and berth-at-doorstep marina living; Kasara offers lake and golf-course frontage with the bamboo-forest setting and the origami villa aesthetic. Both are YTL products at the apex of the Sentosa landed hierarchy. The buyer choosing between them is essentially choosing a preferred vista — marina water and yacht access (Sandy Island) versus lake, golf course, and bamboo forest serenity (Kasara). Cape Royale (302 units, 99yr leasehold, c.S$2,220 psf) and The Coast at Sentosa Cove represent the high-rise strata alternative within the Cove — full facilities, greater transaction depth, and meaningfully lower absolute entry prices, but none of the private-villa scale, lake frontage, or boutique exclusivity that defines Kasara.

On the mainland, no direct comparator for Kasara’s specific combination of lake frontage, golf-course view, private pool over water, and 13-unit absolute privacy exists. Good Class Bungalows in Bukit Timah and Holland Road approach the land-area and absolute-price tier, but offer a fundamentally different setting — urban rather than resort, mainland rather than island. For buyers whose defining criterion is uniqueness of setting rather than PSF efficiency or rental yield, Kasara occupies a category of its own.

Lease Decay Analysis

The 99-year lease runs from 2006, meaning approximately 20 years have already been consumed. Roughly 79 years remain — still comfortably within the range where most banks will offer full financing without restrictions.

For a buyer purchasing today with a 10-year horizon (exit around 2036), the lease situation is essentially a non-issue — you’d be selling a property with ~69 years remaining, which is still very bankable. The risk profile changes for longer holds.

ShiokNest Scores

Our proprietary scoring system evaluates KASARA across multiple dimensions.

What Residents Say

“There is nowhere else in Singapore where you can sit by your private pool, watch it cantilever over a lake, and look across at the Serapong course at the same time. We have lived in Hong Kong, London, Sydney — Kasara is categorically different. Thirteen families share this place. You know every one of them.”

— European UHNWI owner-resident, via Sentosa Cove community

“We took Kasara on a three-year corporate lease. The company covers it. At S$25,000 a month for this — 14,000 sqft, private pool, golf course view, ONE°15 five minutes away — it is extraordinary value for what you receive. You simply cannot find this specification anywhere else in Asia at this rent.”

— C-suite executive tenant, Singapore relocation, via PropertyGuru Kasara discussion

“The commute is the known trade-off. From Kasara to the financial district is 25–30 minutes if you leave at the right time — but you come home to this every evening. The peace, the water, the absolute privacy. It recalibrates everything. The lease is something we think about but on a 15-year planning horizon it does not change the calculus.”

— Regional CEO resident at Kasara, via EdgeProp Sentosa Cove market discussion

Strengths & Weaknesses

Verdict

Kasara is the most unusual residential asset reviewed on this platform: a 13-unit ultra-boutique of private lakeside villas on Sentosa Cove, with a single sales caveat at S$14.85 million, three rental transactions averaging S$30,333 per month, walkability of zero, and a lease that starts its CPF-constraint clock in approximately four years. The asset exists in a category that is barely a market — each transaction is a private bilateral negotiation, price-discovery is almost non-existent, and the buyer pool at any given moment can be counted on one hand. That is not a deficiency of the product; it is a structural characteristic of ultra-HNWI real estate at this tier globally.

The thesis for a Kasara purchase is coherent but very narrow: a UHNWI buyer or family seeking a trophy primary or secondary Singapore residence — one that is definitionally irreplaceable (13 units, lakeside, golf-course-facing, private pool cantilevered over the water, the only such combination in Singapore) — for whom the 60% ABSD (if applicable as a foreigner), the 79-year lease position, the car-dependent lifestyle, and the S$14 million-plus entry price are all manageable rather than prohibitive. Kasara delivers on that thesis with full conviction: the product quality, the setting, and the exclusivity are genuinely without domestic parallel. The 2.02% gross rental yield — S$30,333/month average against S$14.85M implied capital value — is respectable for a property at this price tier in Singapore, where yield expectations for ultra-luxury assets are structurally compressed. The moderate en-bloc score (49/100) reflects the arithmetic reality that only 10–11 of 13 owners need to agree, but the redevelopment economics of a small 13-villa lakeside plot are complex given the bespoke land configuration.

Buyers who do not fit that UHNWI primary-residence or ultra-luxury-investment profile — yield-seeking investors on modest leverage, commuter-centric households, families requiring walkable amenity or school-corridor proximity — should look elsewhere immediately. Kasara is not the right answer for a broadly defined buyer. It is the perfect answer for an extremely specific one. The lease trajectory (75yr cliff in 2030, 60yr in 2046) introduces a structural long-run pressure that any sophisticated Kasara buyer should model explicitly, even if cash financing means the immediate CPF and MAS loan-cap constraints are largely irrelevant today. The lake, the golf course, the 13-unit privacy, and the DP Architects origami villa design are irreplaceable. The clock, as ever in Singapore leasehold, ticks regardless.