Price to Income Ratio of BTO Flats in Mature Estates

41 Mr Pritam Singh asked the Minister for National Development (a) for the first nine months of 2022, what are the prices of three-room, four-room and five-room HDB BTO flats in mature estates at the 25th, median and 75th percentiles, respectively; (b) for the same period, what is the mortgage servicing ratio for flat buyers taking HDB loans who purchased BTO flats in mature estates; and (c) for the same period, what is the house price to income ratio for buyers of BTO flats offered in mature estates.

Mr Desmond Lee: The prices of BTO flats in mature estates offered in the first nine months of 2022 are tabulated in Table 1 below.

While the prices of BTO flats in mature estates are, generally, higher compared to non-mature estates, this is largely attributable to the attractive geographical attributes, for example, proximity to city centre, and proximity to key amenities, for example, key transport nodes and major retail establishments. HDB provides significant subsidies and grants, so that Singaporeans can consider them as options alongside other affordable flats offered in non-mature estates.

Over the same period, among flat buyers who purchased BTO flats in mature estates and collected their keys, more than 80% of them had a mortgage servicing ratio (MSR) of 25% or lower for their HDB loans. This means that these flat buyers can service their HDB loans using their monthly CPF contributions, with little or no cash outlay. This value is significantly lower than the international benchmark of 30% to 35%. The house price-to-income ratios (HPIs) over the same period for the majority of the buyers (more than 70%) was below five. This is considerably lower than other comparable cities, such as London, Los Angeles and Sydney, where the HPIs are between eight to 15 times. In Hong Kong, it is more than 20 times.