The Singapore government had to introduce cooling measures to curb speculation within the public housing market due to a small group of private real estate owners, said Mrs. Lim Hwee Hua, Minister in the Prime Minister’s Office.
“(The Housing and Development Board’s) feedback to us is that, for resale flats, the Cash-Over-Valuation (COV) is rising all the time. So HDB and the Ministry of National Development looked at what’s causing this to rise and who are the participants in the market,” said Mrs. Lim who was answering questions at a dialogue session.
“They realised that there is a group of private property owners, a small percentage who speculate (on) the properties. This has caused prices in certain areas to rise faster,” she said.
Property cooling measures were announced some months back, including the extension of the holding period for the seller’s stamp duty to three years.
“It’s not a restriction on private property owners but a whole series (of measures) to cool the market down. And the starting point is meeting the needs of Singaporeans who would like to own a flat,” added the minister.
HDB announced that it plans to release up to 22,000 flats next year if strong demand continues.
Among the other issues which came up during the dialogue was the Lehman Brothers minibond saga, underlining the need for tougher financial regulation.
“The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) has imposed stricter regulations. So the tightening of regulations is one important aspect,” she said.