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The recent announcement about the Selective En Bloc Redevelopment Scheme (SERS) exercise at Ang Mo Kio shone the spotlight on senior citizens, who were worried about their potential financial burden of paying for their replacement flats. Home & Decor speaks to another group of HDB owners – three singletons from Tanglin Halt – about how SERS has impacted them.
If the Housing Development Board (HDB) announces that your housing estate has been chosen as the latest Selective En Bloc Redevelopment Scheme (SERS) site, you will probably receive a barrage of congratulatory messages from envious friends. After all, according to the HDB, “Only about 5 per cent of all HDB flats are suitable for redevelopment under SERS, and most of these projects with high redevelopment potential have already been selected for the scheme. To date, more than 41,000 households in 82 sites (including the latest site) have benefited from SERS.”
However, not everyone feels like a lottery winner, as evidenced by the reception from residents living in Blocks 562 to 565 at Ang Mo Kio Ave 3. In particular, senior citizens who had already paid off their flats were upset about taking on new financial burdens at their age. The chance to move out from an old flat with just 57 years left on the lease to a ‘more valuable’ new home with a 99-year lease may not appeal to them, who don’t see themselves outliving their old lease anyways.
In response, the government offered a new 50-year lease option for eligible residents aged 45 years and above. Nearly all of the 540 eligible Ang Mo Kio residents will not have to top up any money to move into a similarly-sized replacement flat if they opt for the 50-year lease, announced National Development Minister Desmond Lee. This new policy, along with the usual 99-year lease and the Lease Buyback Scheme for SERS flat owners aged 65 and above, will also apply to flat owners of Blocks 212 to 218 Marsiling Crescent/Lane whose flat will be acquired for the expansion of Woodlands Checkpoint, and all future SERS projects.
Like the affected senior citizens, some singletons who were affected by past SERS exercises may not view a brand new 99-year lease as highly as, say, families who intend to leave their flats behind to their children. Had these singletons been given a choice back then, would they have chosen the 50-year lease? How else has SERS impacted their lives? Home & Decor speaks to three bachelorettes who were uprooted from their homes in Tanglin Halt.
Marguerita Tan, 60, freelance writer; lived in Tanglin Halt for 59 years
Having lived in her flat since she was 1, Marguerita Tan has deep feelings for her childhood home that she inherited from her late parents. “Ten years ago, I’d have been happy to live in Tanglin Halt all my life. But the flat had become so old, it’s not funny,” quips the freelance writer.
Years before the SERS announcement, Marguerita and her neighbours had heard rumours that their estate would be chosen. She received about $373,000 in compensation, plus the $30,000 SERS grant and a refund of $15,000, which she paid for the flat’s upgrading years ago. It was enough to cover her new 65 sqm three-roomed flat’s price of $370,900 and her renovation and furnishing costs. She even had a ‘nett gain’ of $2,850.
Her new home at Margaret Drive is near Queenstown Swimming Pool, which she visits weekly, and the newly reopened Margaret Drive food centre. The best part? She had exchanged her ageing low-rise flat for one with an amazing sunset view from her 38th-floor balcony. Even if she had been given the choice of a 50-year lease when she signed her contract for her new home, Marguerita said she would have chosen the regular 99-year lease anyways. “It is more attractive to potential buyers in the future; young buyers will not be interested in a flat with a 50-year lease,” she reasons. “If I can’t afford it, I would buy a unit on a lower floor or a smaller flat instead of going for a shorter lease. It’s all about your choices,” she pointed out.
She also did not consider ‘cashing out’ by selling her SERS flat off. Some neighbours had done so in 2016 and moved into a resale flat, using part of the compensation money to go on holiday. “I’m happy just having a new house – I didn’t want a resale flat – in a good location that I can live in for the next 20, 30 years of my life, God willing. But in future, if I need to sell it off to move into a nursing home, this would be a good investment to fund it. To me, this house is a blessing,” she says.
Elaine Toh, 58, freelance sports trainer, lived in Tanglin Halt for 14 years
Even though Elaine Toh’s flat was already 40 years old when she purchased it, she was not thinking about its SERS potential at all. “I intended to live there for good because I liked its central location and proximity to the MRT station,” she says. When the SERS news hit, she chose not to wait for a replacement flat because she was unsure of how much they would cost. Instead, she bought a 65 sqm ready unit from the Sale-of-Balance flats at Ghim Moh Link in 2017.
The SERS programme has worked out very well for her. Her two-roomed flat at Tanglin Halt was valued at nearly $300,000. With the grant and removal subsidies given by HDB, it covered the purchase of her new three-roomed flat at $320,000, though she had to pay her renovation cost of $30,000 mostly out of pocket. “I chose a second-floor unit like my old Tanglin Halt flat; I didn’t want to top up for a higher floor.”
The pragmatic Elaine says she would have taken the 50-year lease if given the option. Based on an example provided by HDB, the estimated value of an Ang Mo Kio SERS flat on the sixth-storey is $310,000. The estimated subsidised selling price of a replacement flat with a 99-year lease would cost $308,000 (a little cheaper than what Elaine paid for her second-storey flat in 2017). However, the same flat with a 50-year lease would cost just $233,000. By choosing the shorter lease, the SERS owner would get the remaining cash and/or CPF of $82,000.
“I don’t expect to live over 100 years old. $82,000 can cover the renovation, and I would have about $50,000 cash on hand,” says Elaine. “I feel quite sad for my older Tanglin Halt neighbours who did not have this option. I’m sure they would have appreciated this.”
Choosing a Sale-of-Balance flat back also meant that, unlike her Tanglin Halt neighbours who suffered delays in the handover of their new flats, Elaine was cosily settled, and the clock on her five-year Minimum Occupation Period started ticking since 2017. Some of her Ghim Moh Link neighbours’ units have already transacted at $620,000 to $718,000 in recent months. “My current home is near my workplace, three supermarkets, a Park Connector Network (PCN) and one of the best hawker centres in Singapore. I’m close to friends and have several bus options and a 15-minute walk to the MRT station. If I sell, where will I find another place this convenient for my lifestyle? That’s why every time housing agents come knocking on my door, I tell them I’m not moving!”
An example of a three -room SERS flat owner buying a replacement flat with a lower lease period.
(Table adapted from HDB)
Sharon Lim, 55, content director at a communications agency
Sharon Lim is that rare unicorn who has been hit by two rounds of en bloc sale. In 2009, after her family home at Gillman Heights was acquired to build The Interlace condominium, her parents moved to the West. Sharon decided to look for a bachelorette pad closer to work. “I wanted an old flat in a mature estate because I wanted to own a piece of Singapore history,” recalls the former magazine editor-in-chief.
She fell in love at first sight with a three-roomed, 60 sqm flat at Tanglin Halt. “It was in 1960’s condition, but I went with my gut feeling and confirmed the sale the same night I viewed it.” She paid $271,000 and spent $40,000 to renovate it. “I thought it would be my forever home. So in 2015, when I heard that Tanglin Halt was chosen for SERS and I’d be uprooted again, I was very upset,” said Sharon, who talked about her experience in local photographer Darren Soh’s documentary, Before It All goes: Architecture from Singapore’s early Independence years, in 2018.
Because she paid cash for her home and renovation so that she could be debt free, she had already planned to quit her full-time job and “live on unpredictable income for a while” as a freelance lecturer, writer and PR consultant. The possible financial insecurity from buying and renovating a new home thus worried her.
On the plus side, it was fortunate that the announcement came before she splurged on more renovation on her Tanglin Halt flat that she had been planning. Also, the replacement flat would be in Margaret Drive, where she grew up. The financial burden turned out to be more manageable than she feared. Had she chosen a one-to-one exchange for a new three-roomed flat, the $380,000 compensation she received would ensure she could get some money back. However, she found the 56sqm three-roomed showflat that she viewed too tiny, and chose an 88sqm four-roomed flat on the 33rd floor, just five minutes away from Queenstown MRT station. It cost about $480,000, which Sharon could use her CPF funds to finance. However, the cost of renovation, furniture and appliances, which she estimates to be about $70,000, came from her savings and the cash that HDB had given her.
If she had the choice to take up a 50-year lease in exchange for a cheaper home, Sharon says that at this stage of her life, she might take it up. “Because who is going to live that long? But if I were in my 20s, I wouldn’t. I want a forever home.”
Due to Covid-19 causing delays in the handover and renovation, Sharon will only move into her new flat in September. “I’m one of the last few residents in Tanglin Halt. It’s too quiet. For the first time, I feel left out and want to be part of my community again. After being uprooted twice, I’ve learned one thing: Home is what you make of it, right?” she muses. “I miss the interaction with my Tanglin Halt neighbours. We’re planning to get together when I move in, which is nice. Now, I can’t wait to move because it means a fresh start.”
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