‘PROSTITUTE MANSION’: IS SINGAPORE HEADING FOR HONG KONG-STYLE HOUSING?
http://www.scmp.com/week-asia/busin...ion-singapore-heading-hong-kong-style-housing
Newlyweds Lucas Ng and Stella Tan, for instance, gave up looking for a condominium apartment when buying their first house earlier this year, and settled for a five-room HDB flat instead. “It is simply too expensive, given our starting graduate pay and rising prices,” said Ng, 26, who works in the civil service. “Sometime down the road, we will consider moving into a condo – if it’s still affordable.”
Analysts believe private homes in Singapore will remain within reach. Under the pressure of higher land prices and costs for developers, however, it is the size of the homes that will have to give.
“If we look at what’s going on in the market, it’s still driven by quantum. So if a developer prices a unit above S$2 million, for example, he will face challenging sales,” said Sim. “Look at it this way: the cost of flour has increased but customers are not going to pay more for the bun. What does the baker do? Make the bun smaller. It’s the same with private residential units –
size is being sacrificed here.”
Home sizes are already shrinking. A three-bedroom condominium unit from 15 to 20 years ago, for instance, would have an average space of 1,200 to 1,300 sq ft. But
a three-bedroom apartment today could be as small as 880 sq ft, according to Mak. “Developers will continue to make homes affordable by making smaller and smaller units,” he said. “They will keep the quantum within a certain range, but the price per square foot will be increased.”
But a critical, and unique, buffer for Singapore’s housing scene is its ample supply of good HDB flats, which are comparatively more affordable than similarly sized private housing options. To illustrate, a five-room flat in suburban Bishan could cost between S$700,000 to $800,000, while a typical three-bedroom condominium in the same area could be priced around S$1.3 to S$1.4 million.
