by Brad Bowyer
Over the last few years I have written several articles on the HDB issue, the last ones being on 10th and 11th December 2018 but as this hot topic arose again while I was at Hong Lim and on my threads recently, I want to take you back to them.
The first, and one of the biggest parts of the HDB saga since Lawrence Wong let the cat out of the bag that contrary to years of promises of them being your share in the growth of the nation and a long-term investment your HDB is on a limited lease and will go to zero, is the plainly false justification of why it has to be a 99 year lease.
We were told by the PM at the last National Day Rally that it is because land is limited so we have to reserve it for future generations so let’s look at that more closely.
My father in law had paid off his mortgage, was getting ready to retire when his HDB was compulsory purchased for redevelopment. This was around 2002 and his estate was on Alexandra Road prime plots of land. After the purchase HDB tore down the flats, planted grass, then left the lot empty for at least 4-5 yrs. Then they divided the land and sold the plots to the private sector. And what do we have today? Condos.
Specifically:
- The Metropolitan (TOP 2009)
- Ascentia Sky (TOP 2014)
- Echelon (TOP 2016)
- Alex Residences (TOP 2017)
- Artra (construction started 2017)
And many these are owned by foreigners.
Anecdotally I have had several others tell me similar stories with their blocks acquired under SERS. There are as expected no public records on this but I am yet to hear of ONE HDB site that was redeveloped in to a new HDB under SERS, maybe you could let me know if there is one or were they all sold privately?
So HDB sold the land to private developers for profit and didn’t redevelop it for future Singaporean/HDB generations as the PM suggested was the reason for the 99-year lease.
So instead of my dad retiring and living in this prime area with his friends nearby they allocated him a unit in Tiong Bahru, my brother in law had to add his name because my dad couldn’t qualify/pay for the new instalment or own on his own and he had to go back to work.
And instead of 1 paid off flat for my dad for his retirement and 1 flat for my brother in law to start a new family they ended up with 1 flat for all of them, a new mortgage and no retirement. … and oh yes, a rich few plus some foreigners owning the former HDB site
And this is just part of the PAP HDB scam which will leave most Singaporeans on a never-ending wheel of over paying for a rental home and leaving nothing for future generations.
Only the privileged few who can escape to the private market will ever truly own anything from Singapore’s development.
Still believe they have your best interests at heart? I will go over more tomorrow.
This was first published on Brad Bowyer’s Facebook page and reproduced with permission.