Sales of new private homes fall by half on-month in April

Posted on 15 May 2013 | Comments Off on Sales of new private homes fall by half on-month in April

Sales of new private homes, excluding executive condominiums, halved to 1,375 units in April, compared to March.

This was down from the record 2,793 units sold by developers in March, the highest monthly sale volume since June 2007.

According to the latest figures released by the Urban Redevelopment Authority, the April 2013 figure was also lower than the 2,497 new home sales recorded a year ago.

The drop was mainly due to the fewer units moved in the suburbs and city fringes in April.

URA data showed that developers sold 727 new private homes in April, down 60 per cent from 1,814 in March. The number of new units moved in the city fringe region declined 43 per cent to 470 units.

But the number of new private homes sold in the city area bucked the trend, rising by 13.4 per cent to 178 units in April, compared to the month before.

Source : CNA – 15 May 2013

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Posted in Property Market / Real Estate

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Annual value of properties reviewed regularly

Posted on 15 May 2013 | Comments Off on Annual value of properties reviewed regularly

In his commentary, “Court ruling creates uncertainty for developers” (May 10), Mr Colin Tan seemed to suggest that the Glengary case was the first time the Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore had taken action to reassess the annual value of land under development.

This is not the case. The annual value (AV) of any property, including vacant land under development, is reviewed regularly to reflect prevailing market values in any year. Hence, the AVs may go up or down accordingly.

Real estate developers would be fully aware that the AVs of their lands are assessed on a “vacant land” basis during the development period.

This is provided for in the Property Tax Act, and it has been our long-standing position to disregard pre-sales when determining the AV of such vacant land.

For this case, the developer disagreed with our position and brought the matter to court.

The Court of Appeal has affirmed our position. Hence, the decision would not have introduced more uncertainty into the business of property development nor affected developers’ land bids, as the writer alluded.

FROM
WALTER LIM, DIRECTOR (CORPORATE COMMUNICATIONS), INLAND REVENUE AUTHORITY OF SINGAPORE

Source : Today – 15 May 2013

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Posted in Developers, HDB, Tax Matters / Property Tax

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