Last week. HDB announced a slew of new cooling measures that were designed to, amongst other things, moderate the demand for flats in the HDB Resale Market. If you need a primer on the full suite of cooling measures, read my previous article here:
The 15-month wait out period
Amongst the new measures, the most impactful one is the novel 15-month wait out period.
This measure will affect many current and former private property owners as they will now need to serve a wait-out period of 15 months after selling their private properties before they are eligible to buy a non-subsidised resale flat.
Seniors who are are aged 55 and above who are moving from their private property to a 4-room or smaller flat, and persons facing extenuating circumstances, may be exempt from this rule.
In my previous article, I also shared that, as the operative date for this measure is the date on which the submission was made, and not the date of the OTP, many buyers and sellers may have their OTPs voided.
According to clause 16 of the OTP contract – HDB_OTP_20221001T154319Z – where HDB’s approval is not obtained or revoked, and no one is at fault, the Option shall become null. That is to say, the seller must return all fees, including the option fee and option exercise fee, to the buyer. Each party will bear their own costs.
As this is a situation that may reasonably be described as one where the HDB’s approval is not granted due to the fault of neither the buyer nor the seller but the latest slew of measures, it is likely that clause 16 would be applicable.
Fake News by AsiaOne?
As the wait-out period has caused many potential buyers and sellers anxiety, and as the original press release by MND, MAS, and HDB was scant on details relating to how the appeals will be heard and decided, it is understandable that property owners will try to look on social media for more information and clarity on the cooling measures.
One article that they might stumble upon is this article on AsiaOne dated 3 October 2022.
At the bottom of the article, it is stated that the article was first published on Stackedhomes. However, as you will see in this article, not everything in the AsiaOne article may be found in the Stackedhomes article as of 6 October 2022.
AsiaOne’s claims on Executive Condominiums
In the AsiaOne article, there is a portion that appears to be absent from the original Stackedhome article. This is the same portion that I find misleading.
Within the sub-section on the 15-month wait out period, AsiaOne asserts, in no uncertain terms, that
“Note that this ruling does not affect Executive Condominiums (ECs) that are not yet fully privatised (less than 10 years old) as they are still considered private developments…”
From a plain reading of the extract above, the author is claiming that owners of ECs which are less than 10 years old will not be affected by the 15-month wait out period.
If this is true, this would be quite the loophole. Arguably, it may defeat the stated purpose of the cooling measures as a whole too.
Some of my clients on my Telegram group and followers on TikTok called me and messaged me about this paragraph. When I first read it, I was confused as this was the first time I was hearing about it.
This was also odds with my own understanding, which was that the 15-month wait out period would affect all owners of ECs which have passed the MOP date (5 years). After the MOP period, the EC will be treated as a privatised property and, therefore, the 15-month wait out period would apply.
It bears noting that AsiaOne is no ordinary publication but one that is under the Singapore Press Holdings and mm2 Asia. Put simply, it is a source that is supposed to be trusted and relied upon by many.
I called HDB to fact-check
Wanting to get to the bottom of the matter, I called HDB directly to fact-check the claims in the AsiaOne article.
When I spoke with an officer from the HDB, Amira (apologies if I spelt your name wrongly!), she confirmed that, as a 5-year-old EC is considered privatised, the 15-month wait out period would apply.
To be clear, and for avoidancthe owner of a 5-year-old EC WILL be affected by the 15-month wait out period.
With this clarification from HDB, I hope AsiaOne and/or StackedHomes can retract the potentially misleading portions of their article. It is clearly false to claim that ECs which are less than 10-years-old will not be affected by the 15-month wait out period.
I have also made a video about this issue, which you can check out below:
https://www.tiktok.com/@thatproperty.guy/video/7151238777480989953?is_from_webapp=1&sender_device=pc&web_id=7092076109218727426
Such claims can have the unintended effect of sending wrong signals to owners of private property, and they should be corrected as soon as possible.
As my wife, That Property Girl, astutely notes in the comments section of the video, “just because it is presented in an article, it does not mean that it is all true”.
Response from AsiaOne and StackedHomes
A few hours after this article was published, AsiaOne left a comment on Wake Up Singapore’s Instagram post to inform us that we had “missed an update”.
The update, which occurred after this article was published, was presumably AsiaOne deleting the impugned portions of the article. Shaik Amar responded to AsiaOne’s comment to ask, amongst other things, the exact nature of the update.
A few hours later, StackedHomes added an editor’s note to its article to explain and apologise for the “admittedly confusing” paragraph.
On Instagram, StackedHomes clarified that AsiaOne syndicated the content from StackedHomes.
As always, if you have any questions or opinions on the property market, feel free to reach out to me on Instagram, TikTok, or Telegram!
Shaik Amar is a writer with Wake Up Singapore and is a CEA licensed realtor in Singapore under the Estate Agent, ERA Realty Pte Ltd. The ideas, suggestions, general principles, examples and other information presented here are for reference and educational purposes only.
This article and all of the articles written are not in any way intended to provide investment advice or recommendations to buy, sell or lease properties or any form of property investment/transaction. Shaik Amar & Wake Up Singapore shall have no liability for any loss of expense whatsoever, relating to the investment and property decisions made by the consumer & reader of this article. We strongly urge each reader to always seek professional opinion from any CEA licensed professional property consultant before making property related decision. CEA Licence No. L3002382K • R058640H
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