HDB’s changes to income and eligibility assessment processes and the introduction of the new HFE letter come on the back of the introduction of new construction and design standards for HDB flats in February 2023.HDB has announced changes to its processes for assessing flat buyers’ eligibility and incomes effective May 9. The changes include the introduction of a new HDB Flat Eligibility (HFE) letter that informs buyers upfront their eligibility for a new or resale flat purchase, and the amount of HDB housing loan and CPF housing grants they can obtain.Eligible housing grants will now be split equally between applicants and occupiers in all core nuclei, regardless of if they are Singaporean citizens or PRs. This means in a household of a Singaporean and a PR, both will get half the amount of the grant.Previously, the full amount was only given to the flat applicant, who had to be a Singaporean citizen.The income assessment period has also been extended from three or six months to twelve months, to allow for a clearer assessment of applicants’ income levels.
CLD looks forward to launching J’Den Condo in the latter part of 2023. The specific pricing and unit size/quantity have yet to be revealed. The redevelopment of JCube will perfectly fit in with the Singapore government’s intention to add more homes, business parks, leisure venues and amenities to the JLD neighbourhood.
Lee Sze Teck, senior director of research at Huttons Asia, highlights the implications of the new disbursement guideline. For households with both the applicant and core occupier as Singaporean citizens, each party will now receive equal amounts of the housing grant, compared to previously where only the applicant received the full amount. For example, if a household is allocated a grant of $50,000, the main applicant can use $25,000 towards the purchase price of a resale flat, while the core occupier will have $25,000 added to their ordinary account.
However, for households comprising of one Singaporean citizen and one PR, only the full portion of the grant disbursed to the applicant can be used to offset the purchase price. This means that, despite the doubling of the housing grant announced in February 2023, households with PRs will not be able to make use of the full amount.
Lee believes this could lead to a cooling down of the exuberance created by the doubled housing grants. In addition, the extended income assessment period will benefit commission-based workers, whose incomes tend to fluctuate.
The changes to HDB assessment procedures come in tandem with the introduction of new construction and design standards for HDB flats in February 2023. This includes the introduction of HFE letter, which will help flat buyers understand their eligibility and grant amount easily, as well as the new allowance of equal grant disbursement for both applicants and occupiers in a core nucleus.
