St Catherine, Jamaica, 21 June 2024 — Sagicor Group Jamaica has officially launched New Brunswick Village, a mixed-use gated development in Spanish Town that the company describes as the first of its kind in St Catherine. The project, representing a 6-billion-dollar investment, combines 89 residential spaces with 40 commercial units on approximately 12 acres of land along Brunswick Avenue in the old capital.
The development features one- and two-bedroom apartments, studio units, and two-bedroom townhouses, with residential prices ranging from 23.3 million dollars for ground-floor apartments to 40.8 million dollars for townhouses. Fifty per cent of the commercial units have already been sold to established tenants including a pharmacy, restaurant chains, a supermarket, and financial services operators, with a further 20 per cent reserved for lease by the developer’s own subsidiary.
A Bet on Spanish Town
The significance of this project lies not only in its scale but in its location. Spanish Town has for decades carried a reputation that made institutional investors hesitant. Its commercial district declined as Kingston expanded and absorbed economic activity. Its residential market remained largely informal and under-served by the private sector. For a major financial institution to invest six billion dollars in a mixed-use gated community here represents a genuine signal of confidence in the area’s trajectory.
Sagicor’s own executives have acknowledged the risk. The company describes the investment as a calculated bet, one that appears to be paying off. The commercial component is substantially pre-committed. The residential units are aimed at middle-income professionals seeking the combination of urban convenience, improved security, and community amenities that gated development provides.
The Affordable Housing Question
The Prime Minister, attending the official launch, used the occasion to raise the persistent gap between the aspirational housing being delivered by private developers and the entry-level product that the majority of Jamaicans need. The example he offered was instructive: a nearby NHT scheme in Bernard Lodge, Catherine’s Estate, received more than 26,000 expressions of interest for just 500 units priced at 6 to 7.5 million dollars. The disproportion between that demand and the availability of supply in that price range continues to define the central challenge of Jamaica’s housing market.
New Brunswick Village will not house the population waiting for those 500 units. But it may demonstrate to the private sector that investing in secondary cities beyond Kingston and Montego Bay can generate commercial returns. If that demonstration effect reaches other institutional investors and developers, the long-term consequence for St Catherine’s property market could be substantial.
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