Buyers who bough private non-landed homes in uncompleted projects and then sold them in H1 2014 before the issuance of Certificate of Statutory Completion held their properties for a longer period due to the seller’s stamp duty (SSD), based on a research by Ngee Ann Polytechnic as reported in the media.
Known as subsales, this type of transaction is considered as a barometer of property speculation.
In the luxury segment, nearly all subsale caveats lodged for such properties during the second half of the year were attributed to units purchased between 2009 and 2010. Hence, these transactions were exempted from the SSD. In the Core Central Region (CCR), there were no subsale caveats for units bought in the past two years.
As for the mass-market segment, 73 percent of subsale transactions were traced to units that had been taken up in 2009 to 2010.
“Back in 2009, pre-SSD, there were units flipped within the same year of purchase. However, in H1 2014, there were no subsale caveats registered that involved units bought last year,” said lecturer Feily Sofian at Ngee Ann Polytechnic’s School of Design & Environment.
In 2010, the SSD was imposed for homes purchased on or before 20 February 2010 and then flipped within a year. Subsequently, the stamp duty was extended to residential properties bought starting from 30 August 2010 and then sold within three years.
The holding period was prolonged to four years by early-2011 with higher tax rates. Specifically, buyers who purchase homes starting from 14 January 2011 had to pay a stamp duty of 16 percent if he sells the property within the first year, 12 percent for the second year, eight percent for the third and four percent for the fourth.
Muneerah Bee, Senior Journalist at PropertyGuru, edited this story. To contact her about this or other stories email muneerah@propertyguru.com.sg
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