How to Upgrade from HDB Flat to Private Property?

How to Upgrade from HDB Flat to Private Property?

Kumar Properties

How to Upgrade from HDB Flat to Private Property?

In Singapore, almost 80% of the people have HDB flats. Their main aim is to buy better private property. If you have bought your first HDB flat with an easy process, they upgrading HDB flat is simple. But upgrading from an HDB flat to private property is much harder than buying first HDB flat. 

Why Buying HDB Flat is Much Easier Than Upgrading From HDB to Private Property?

When you buy your first property, you will be having main concern about the minimum paying downpayment and you will be thinking about whether you will qualify for an HDB/ bank loan. If you want to choose an HDB loan, the minimum downpayment required is 10% and for a Bank loan, the minimum downpayment required is 25% and 5% should be cash. Because of this reason, many of HDB buyers prefer HDB loan instead of Bank loan eventhough interest rate of bank loans are higher.

When upgrading from HDB flat to private property, steps will be much more complex. If you are careless while processing, there will be much more chances of getting something wrong. Still for upgrading HDB to private property is a double process, first you need to sell your HDB flat then you need to buy property. 

So for upgrading HDB flat to private condo consulting property agent is the best idea to make process in smooth way. The property agent will guide in every step of selling and buying process of property. You will be having stress process for upgrading your property.

Do You Want to Sell Your HDB Flat Before Buying a Private Property?

If you want to upgrade from HDB flat to private condo, my suggestion is to first sell your HDB flat then plan for a condo. By selling your HDB flat you will receive some amount of money and you can analyse which property you can afford. Then you can afford better property than you think. Secondly, if you sell your existing hdb flat within 6 months you can avoid 12% of ABSD (Additional Buyer Stamp Duty). Selling your HDB flat in a hurry to get ABSD remission is the last thing you want to happen, as this may result in accepting a lower offer than you wanted.

For instance, if you want to buying other private property, price of that condo is $1 million you need to pay 12% of ABSD that means you need to pay $120,000. If you have not sold your HDB flat upon exercising the option to purchase the private property.

Steps to Upgrading from HDB flat to Private Property

Step 1: Making decision to sell your HDB flat:

If you decided to sell property, engaging with property agent is the best thing to complete selling process easy. Before giving your property for marketing make sure to discuss about the commission fee and exclusive agreement with the real estate agent. 

One of the best agent for selling property or upgrading your property is Kumar. He will help you to sell your property above market value and also give suggestions for next purchase of your property. First you need to register your intent to sell for your HDB flat. You can only grant an Option-To-Purchase (OTP) to buyers at least 7 days after registering your intent to sell. Depending on the location, demand on your property it takes time to sell your property.

Step 2: Issuing An Option-To-Purchase (OTP), Receiving The Option Fee & Exercise Fee

If you market your HDB flat and you will be receiving so many offers from the buyers. You should choose potential buyer who can offer more money to buy your HDB. To grant the OTP for an HDB flat, the potential buyer needs to pay an option fee of between $1 to $1,000. This is unlike buying a private property when the option fee is usually at least 1% of the mutually agreed price.

In the case of a poor valuation report, the cash over value (COV) will be $50,000. If the HDB valuation report is only $450,000, the flat will cost $500,000, but the cash over valuation (COV) will be $50,000. As HDB will only perform the valuation after the OTP is issued, buyers and sellers faced some uncertainty.

It doesn’t matter whether you have issued the buyer an OTP or not. They can still look for other flats that are more suitable for them. The same block/level as a parent’s HBD flat may suddenly become available to an already committed buyer for a similar price. In such a situation, even if they have paid you $1,000 for the OTP, they may choose the other flat and not exercise it. Alternatively, they may find a cheaper flat, even after accounting for the option fee that they have paid.

During this period, you cannot issue an OTP to another buyer. If your buyer does not exercise his OTP within 21 working days, the option lapses, and you are allowed to grant your OTP to other buyers.

To exercise the OTP, the buyer will need to pay a deposit to you. This is an amount that should not exceed $5,000.

Step 3: Once The Buyer Exercise The OTP, You Can Start Looking For Your Private Property

Once your buyer has exercised the OTP for your HDB flat, this gives you the leeway to start looking for your private property.

At this point in time, you would already know the selling price of your HDB flat and how much cash proceed you will get from the sales. You will also have a gauge on when you are expected to hand over your keys to the new owners. This basically acts as the timeline to finding your new place.

Most importantly, according to IRAS, once an agreement to sell your HDB has been issued and executed to buy the property, it’s no longer considered as a residential property that you own. Essentially, this means that if you buy a private property after the OTP for your HDB has been exercised by the buyer, you would not be liable for ABSD.

sell hdb flat

Source: IRAS

Depending on how urgent you need to move into your new home, you may need to speed up the process of purchasing your private property. A piece of advice here would be to shortlist a few potential places that you can afford in advance before you sell your HDB flat. This allows you to immediately start looking and negotiating for your private property purchase once your buyer has exercised the option to purchase your HDB flat,

Alternatively, if you have interim housing solutions for your family, you will have more time to search for your next property purchase.

Step 4: Calculate Carefully Your Cash Flow Timeline From Selling The HDB Flat

Being able to afford to upgrade from an HDB flat to a private property is one thing. Managing the cash flow situation that is required to complete the transaction smoothly is another. Here’s a scenario to explain.

Let’s assume you have sold your HDB flat for $500,000. With an existing loan of $200,000, your proceeds will be $300,000. Of this, $150,000 needs to be refunded to your CPF Ordinary Account (OA). We also assume that the private property purchase would be $1 million.

For simplicity, let’s assume that the option for your HDB flat was exercised on 1 January. After the option had been exercised, both buyers and sellers must submit a resale application for HDB to approve. We assume that this was done in 2 weeks’ time, on 15 January.

Upon receiving the resale application, HDB will post the application results – if all documents are in order – within 14 working days (about three weeks),. This will bring us to the first week of February.

Upon HDB’s acceptance, it will take about 8 weeks from the date of acceptance to process the sales application. Based on the timeline, this brings us to the first week of April. You will receive your cash proceeds during that period, but it will take about a week before the refund is made to your CPF. This means that you will only have the full disposable cash and CPF amount of $300,000 to utilise for your private property purchase sometime in mid-April.

Step 5: Cashflow Timeline For Buying A Private Property

The cash flow timeline from purchasing a private property is crucial. Since the HDB flat has been sold for $500,000 with an outstanding loan of $200,000, you will get a sales balance of $300,000. On paper, with $300,000 in cash and CPF to deploy, you would be able to meet the minimum down payment requirement of $250,000 (25% of $1 million).

However, that is not the only thing to be concerned about. Cash flow timeline management is also vital.

To make an offer for a private property, you usually have to pay an option fee of 1%. This means that you need $10,000 in cash to secure the OTP. By default, you need to pay the remaining 4% to exercise your option within two weeks though you can negotiate the option period with the seller.

Thus, to exercise the option, you need a total of $50,000 in cash. This means that you either need to have the cash on hand to secure and exercise the OTP, or wait till early April when you receive the cash proceeds from the completed sale of the HDB flat. You will also need to pay the buyer stamp duty in cash, which is about $24,600 for a $1 million property. All in all, the total cash outlay to secure the OTP, exercise the option and pay the buyer stamp duty is $74,600, for a $1 million private property.

Assuming you have enough cash, you have the means to start searching, secure the OTP and exercise the option for your private property before early April. If you do not have enough cash, you will need to wait until the full amount from the sale of your HDB flat is credited to you.

Typically, upon exercising your option for a private property purchase, it will take about 12 weeks for the date of completion for the property. Say, if your HDB option was exercised on 1 January, and you exercised the option to purchase your private property on 19 January, then the date of completion would be around 19 April. This gives you just enough time to ensure that you have received the proceeds from the sale of your HDB, to pay for the down payment required for your private property.

The table below shows the timeline beginning from the sale of your HDB flat to the purchase of your private property.

sell hdb flat

As you can see from the table above, the timeline is relatively tight when it comes to when you would receive the full amount from the sale of your HDB flat, and when you need to pay the down payment to complete the purchase of your private property. If you don’t have enough funds, you will need to delay the completion of your private property purchase.

During this period, you will need to secure the bank loan required to finance your private property purchase and engage a law firm to assist you with the paperwork required to complete your property transaction. Legal fees would typically cost you between $2,500 to $3,000. You will also need to pay the commission to your agent, which will typically be deducted from the proceeds that you get from the sale of your HDB flat.

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Private New Home Sales Receded By 64% In June On Dearth Of New Launches; High-end Home Sales Continue To Shine

Private New Home Sales Receded By 64% In June On Dearth Of New Launches; High-end Home Sales Continue To Shine

Kumar Properties

Private New Home Sales Receded By 64% In June On Dearth Of New Launches; High-end Home Sales Continue To Shine

Private new home sales fell sharply in June as the lack of fresh project launches drove a 64% decline in transactions from May to June. Developers sold 488 new private homes (ex. Executive Condos) in June, declining from the robust 1,355 units transacted in the previous month, where new projects Piccadilly Grand and Liv @ MB spurred take-up. On a year-on-year basis, sales also came in lower, easing by 44% from June 2021.

June’s transaction numbers take the Q2 2022 new home sales to 2,504 units (ex ECs), which represents a 37.2% increase from the previous quarter. In the first half of 2022, developers sold an estimated 4,329 new homes.

URA NEW HOMES JUNE 2022 TABLE 1

The Core Central Region (CCR) led new private home sales in June, with 206 transactions – down by 4.2% from May. The top performing CCR projects in June were Haus on Handy which sold 21 units at a median price of $2,654 psf, Leedon Green which transacted 20 units at a median price of $2,843 psf, and Irwell Hill Residences which shifted 19 units at a median price of $2,876 psf.

Due to the lack of fresh projects, new home sales in the Rest of Central Region (RCR) in June fell markedly by 81% MOM to 171 units from the high base of 893 units in May, where the launch of Piccadilly Grand and Liv @ MB helped to supercharge sales in the sub-market. The best-selling RCR projects during the month were Riviere which sold 25 units at a median price of $2,856 psf, and Normanton Park which moved 21 units at a median price of $1,864 psf.

Meanwhile, just 111 new homes were sold in June in the Outside Central Region (OCR) amid depleting unsold inventory – sales were down by 55% from the previous month. The top sellers in the OCR in June were The Florence Residences which sold 20 units at a median price of $1,746 psf and The Watergardens at Canberra where 16 units were transacted at a median price of $1,463 psf.

In the EC segment, 8 new units were sold in June, posting a 60% fall from 20 transactions in May. The best-selling EC project in May was North Gaia EC, where 5 units changed hands at a median price of $1,303 psf.

Developers placed 397 new units (ex. ECs) for sale in June compared to the 1,240 units that were put on the market in May. In Q2 2022, developers launched an estimated 2,034 new private homes for sale.

Ms Wong Siew Ying, Head of Research & Content, PropNex Realty:

“The wane in new home sales in June as well as the magnitude of decline were expected, given that there were no fresh projects put up for sale during the month and considering the new-launches fuelled surge in sales in May. In addition, the resumption of international travel and the June holidays – where families tend to go on vacation abroad – may also have contributed to the slower market activities.

Generally, June’s sales performance did not detract much from the general narrative. That being, the lack of launches and dwindling unsold stock in the OCR continuing to weigh on the mass market sales volume, and that some buyers are finding CCR projects increasingly compelling, as the average transacted unit price ($PSF) gap continued to narrow between new private home sales in CCR and the RCR to 16.1% in June, compared to 21.4% in May (see Table 1).

Meanwhile, URA Realis caveat data showed that foreigners bought 11.7% of the new private homes (see Chart 1) sold in June – mainly in the CCR and RCR– rising from 6% in the previous month. Singaporeans accounted for nearly 76% of new home sales in June and we expect this number to rise in the coming months, as more mass-market projects are launched.

With the launch of AMO Residence on 23 July, we anticipate that new home sales this month should outperform that of June. In addition, some buyers may want to get transactions done before the Hungry Ghost month starts at the end of July.”

Ms Wong Siew Ying, Head of Research & Content, PropNex Realty: “The wane in new home sales in June as well as the magnitude of decline were expected, given that there were no fresh projects put up for sale during the month and considering the new-launches fuelled surge in sales in May. In addition, the resumption of international travel and the June holidays – where families tend to go on vacation abroad – may also have contributed to the slower market activities.  Generally, June’s sales performance did not detract much from the general narrative. That being, the lack of launches and dwindling unsold stock in the OCR continuing to weigh on the mass market sales volume, and that some buyers are finding CCR projects increasingly compelling, as the average transacted unit price ($PSF) gap continued to narrow between new private home sales in CCR and the RCR to 16.1% in June, compared to 21.4% in May (see Table 1).  Meanwhile, URA Realis caveat data showed that foreigners bought 11.7% of the new private homes (see Chart 1) sold in June – mainly in the CCR and RCR– rising from 6% in the previous month. Singaporeans accounted for nearly 76% of new home sales in June and we expect this number to rise in the coming months, as more mass-market projects are launched.  With the launch of AMO Residence on 23 July, we anticipate that new home sales this month should outperform that of June. In addition, some buyers may want to get transactions done before the Hungry Ghost month starts at the end of July.”
URA NEW HOMES JUNE 2022 TABLE 3

This is the news article from Propnex

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Things You Should Know About Property Investment

Things You Should Know About Property Investment

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Things You Should Know About Property Investment

While you are buying a property, you are not just buying a unit or residential property itself, you are also investing in the surroundings and the neighborhood – not for now but also for the future. Generally, buying property in an unsafe neighborhood or inconvenient location is not good for investment.

Buying property at good location can increase the value of your property in the future. Because of upcoming MRT Stations, new amenities home value will rise day by day. Apart from location analysis, most of the investors will review the capitol growth and rental potential of residential property. As well as investors think targeted tenants when you lease out the unit for rental income. 

So when you want to invest in any property, first doing research about the residential property is the best option or try to contact property agent. Here are four important considerations that investors should mull over – preferably with the help of a reliable real estate agent – in assessing potential buying opportunities.

1. Analyse the blueprint that charts urban transformation

It’s always helpful to have a blueprint for a locale to see how it might grow. That’s why the Urban Redevelopment Authority’s Master Plan – updated every five years – is so useful. We are revising some of our familiar places for a more efficient land use as part of the Master Plan 2019, creating sustainable green spaces and amenities that can support our future needs. Some notable examples of the ongoing urban transformations include Jurong Lake District, Greater Southern Waterfront, Punggol Digital District, and the Woodlands Regional Centre.

Property Investors

Image 1: Bishan Master Plan 2019

Source: URA

According to the Master Plan 2019 for the area around Bishan MRT station (see Image 1), there is a commercial-zoned site marked as “subject to detailed planning” in Blue. A new commercial development such as offices or a mixed-use development (office/retail/hotel) can potentially be built on the site in the future – which will integrate with the existing services. If a buyer is looking to buy a home in that immediate vicinity, this detail in the Master Plan 2019 could be useful in assessing the growth potential.

For instance, having more commercial offerings nearby could bring greater convenience to residents while having more companies set up in the new offices may boost rental appeal of homes there.

2. Capital appreciation and rental prospects

In general, the transformation of urban spaces would usually result in improved accessibility and connectivity to amenities and infrastructure both old and new – enhancing residents’ lives. While there are often many factors influencing price trends (such as demand and supply dynamics and the health of the economy), the introduction of new amenities into the area tend to make the place more desirable and help to support prices and rental values.

Take Jurong East, for instance, the precinct has undergone a major makeover over the years, with the development of several commercial properties and new homes bringing a new lease of life to the neighbourhood. Based on URA Realis caveat data, it is noted that the average transacted price of non-landed resale private homes in Jurong East has risen steadily after the completion of JCube, JEM and Westgate over the 2012 to 2013 period, followed by the opening of the Ng Teng Fong General Hospital in 2015 – the average price went up from $839 psf in 2015 to $1,219 psf in 2022 (see Chart 1).

As the transformation of Jurong East took form, the home leasing market also appeared to improve. In terms of the rental volume, Jurong East saw a spike in Q2 2017 (see Chart 2) where the number of rental contracts rose by about 64% QOQ to 355 from 217 in the previous quarter. The leasing volume continued to hover at around the 200 to 300 range ever since, higher than the 100 to 150 rental contracts prior to 2016. Meanwhile, although quarterly median rental rate ($psf per month) showed some fluctuations, it was still generally trending upwards.

With the upcoming Jurong Lake District – dubbed as Singapore’s biggest business district outside the Central Region – set to become an exciting lifestyle, business and tourism hub, investors and future residents could potentially see some capital appreciation over the mid- to long-term.

3. Potential future tenants and/or resale buyers

Knowing the target audience matters. Investors will need to envision who are the potential tenants of the unit – are they going to be an expatriate family with school-going children, a young couple without any kids, or busy professionals who are single? This visualisation exercise is useful in that it helps to narrow down the locations and facilitate in drawing up a shortlist of suitable properties.

For instance, having schools within a 1- to 2-km radius attracts families with kids and young couples who are looking to start a family. In particular, expats may look for a property near international schools that their children could attend. Meanwhile, close proximity to key employment nodes or industry clusters would likely appeal to working professionals, who may appreciate the convenience of living and working in the same area. In addition, being near to an MRT station is an added advantage, and units that are close to MRT stations also tend to enjoy a higher rental yield.

Selecting a home with attributes that appeal to the wider masses is equally important. Based on the Property Ownership Aspiration Survey 2022 by the NUS Institute of Real Estate and Urban Studies (IREUS), the key attributes which residents of non-landed private homes look for are: a spacious and functional layout, close proximity to a current/future MRT station and/or shopping centres, a master bedroom of a good size, and the reputation of the developers.

4. Holding power/period

The process of urban renewal and transformation could take years, even decades. Hence, buying into an area with ongoing or planned rejuvenation efforts may not translates to immediate gains. Investors need to ensure that they have adequate financial holding power to weather any market volatility for at least 3 to 5 years. As real estate is a long-term investment play, it is more likely that investors could stand to enjoy better capital appreciation by holding the property over an extended period.

Here, it is also useful to consider the leasehold tenure of the property. Investors who are looking to hand the property to their children may be more interested in freehold homes, which tend to preserve their values and will not be affected by the issue of lease decay facing leasehold properties.

As with all forms of investments, buying a property involves risks. However, proper and thorough planning can help to mitigate those risks and hopefully offer a greater peace of mind as you embark on your real estate investment journey.

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