Daily Archives: 28 Sep 2009

40 per cent of buyers of HDB resale flats are PRs

Posted on 28 Sep 2009 | Comments Off on 40 per cent of buyers of HDB resale flats are PRs

According to Eugene Lim, Associate Director of ERA Asia-Pacific, the prices of resale HDB flats have shot up by 38 per cent over the last three and a half years.

What’s more shocking is that 40 per cent of the buyers are permanent residents from data gathered from recent ERA’s resale transactions.

The prices of HDB resale flats hit a record high in June this year and is set to rise by another 1 to 2 per cent.

Despite the sky-rocketing prices, both the National Development Minister Mah Bow Tan and HDB continue to insist that HDB flats remain affordable to ordinary Singaporeans.

HDB has been busy of late replying to letters in the Straits Times forum on the rising prices of HDB flats. It claimed that public housing is still affordable in Singapore because its prices lie below the 30 per cent international benchmark for housing affordably.

As PRs do not qualified to buy new flats from HDB directly, they will have no choice but to buy their homes from the resale market thereby pushing the prices up. Continue reading →

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Posted in HDB

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Keeping cool in the heat

Posted on 28 Sep 2009 | Comments Off on Keeping cool in the heat

Are the recent measures by the government to cool the property market appropriate and effective?

Pauline Goh
Managing Director
CB Richard Ellis Singapore

THE measures are aimed at cooling the market by lowering demand and increasing supply. On the demand side, the removal of the special payment schemes will effectively encourage homebuyers to reassess their cashflow position carefully before they make purchase commitments. Those who have sufficient funds only for the upfront 20 per cent downpayment and are relying on the future sale of their existing homes to help finance their new purchases may now be encouraged to hold back on newly launched projects and possibly look instead to the secondary market including projects that are close to TOP.

On the supply side, the re-introduction of the confirmed list back into the government land sales programme will provide better visibility to the market on the pipeline of future supply.

These measures should help to moderate, to more sustainable levels, the current sales momentum which has escalated since March and looks set to easily exceed the record volume of 14,811 units in 2007.

Laura Deal
Executive Director
The American Chamber of Commerce in Singapore

THE American Chamber of Commerce in Singapore just conducted its eighth annual Business Outlook Survey of US businesses across Asean. As part of this survey, companies rate their satisfaction level with aspects of the business environment of the country in which they operate. Continue reading →

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Posted in Property Market / Real Estate

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