Besides being a food haven, Geylang is also known for being Singapore’s not-so-covert red-light district.
While the area has gained notoriety for their shophouse brothels, conservative Singapore still largely deems sex work a vice — to be hidden and not to be paraded around.
So when an advertisement was put up seeking a “brothel operator” in Geylang, it immediately got netizens’ attention and became a subject of mockery.
On Tuesday (15 Dec), the Council of Estate Agencies (CEA) instructed the property agent to take down the listing or change its wording.
The original listing titled “Seeking Brothel Operator @ Geylang Lorong 20” was put up on Commercial Guru and 99.co 2 weeks ago, reported 99.co.
On Tuesday (15 Dec), attention was drawn to the listing when a netizen shared about it on the Complaint Singapore Facebook group.
Netizens were quick to joke about the listing. Replying to someone asking about what a brothel operator does, someone quipped “QC and get supply”.
Many other netizens also left comments about getting hired for jobs there.
Speaking to MS News, the property agent in charge of the listing shared that he received a phone call from the Council of Estate Agencies (CEA) later that day.
The agency instructed him to remove the listing or reword it. CEA had contacted him multiple times on the day itself to remove the listings on both 99.co and Commercial Guru.
CEA reasoned that the language used in the listing was “inappropriate”.
Eventually, the listing was changed from “Seeking Brothel Operator” to just “Shophouse”.
However, at the time of writing, a quick search on Google still shows the OG wordings.
The property agent told MS News that the landlord had specifically instructed him to find a licensed brothel tenant for the property.
Since operating a brothel with a license is legal and the property along Lorong 20 Geylang is within the red-light district, he went ahead to list it as it is.
According to 99.co, the agent had tried to look for alternatives to the word “brothel” but decided to list it as it is as he could not come up with one
His priority, after all, is to look for a tenant that fulfils his clients’ instructions.
Elaborating, the property agent claims that authorities are ambiguous on the exact area of the red-light district.
Instead, a brothel is deemed legal if the tenant holds an operating licence.
Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) currently zones the shophouse as a commercial institutional but it is also approved as a residential property.
In the past, the shophouse in question had been used as a brothel, reported 99.co.
Seeing such a property listing, many of us understandably can’t help but crack a joke about it.
So it shouldn’t come as a surprise that the agent had received a few not-so-serious queries regarding the listing over the past few weeks.
However, he maintained that he is looking for genuine enquires about the property from licensed individuals.
Well, it might have given us a good laugh but we wish the agent all the best as he faces the tall task of finding suitable renters for the property.
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Featured image adapted from Facebook and Dream Holiday Asia.
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