December, 2010:

Inspired by this article, on Singapore’s best Applications, iProperty.com Singapore has put together its list of the best applications for your smart phone or tabloid for finding, decorating and living in a property in Singapore.

iProperty.com Singapore

Alright, alright, we’re blowing our own trumpet – but if you’re looking to rent, buy or sell a property in Singapore, the iProperty.com Singapore iPhone App is hard to beat.

It has over 40,000 places for sale and lease in its database, of which you can search by location, price, size, agent, developer, amongst other options. The app also delivers property-related news.

Don’t just take our word for it though. Simon Baker, editor at Property Portal Watch, praised its versatility and breadth of search options saying, “Users can easily search properties by proximity or a range of different search criteria. They can also view driving directions, loan calculators, and easliy contact agents from each listing page.” iProperty has a good track record in producing popular property apps, their sister site iproperty.com.my’s app, which made it to the top of the free apps list after its launch only a few weeks ago.

Get the iProperty.com Singapore iPhone App, here.
Or, get the iProperty.com Singapore iPad App, here.


Handy Carpenter


You’ve just purchased your new home, but now you want to decorate it to suit your style and taste. While HDB regulations and limitations of knowledge mean that you will have to get a professional contractor for the big stuff, a little knowledge of DIY can go a long way.

At this time of year it seems only appropriate that we feature something that a carpenter might use, and the Handy Carpenter App has some of the most useful carpentry tools on it, including:


• A plumb bob, the easiest way for you to verify the vertical of lines or walls
• A surface level, the best tool to check if a surface is flat
• A steel protractor, measuring angles from 0 to 180 degrees.
• 
A steel ruler, supporting both inches and centimetres. By swiping it left and right, you measure things much longer than your iPhone.

Australian expatriate and award-winning blogger, who wrote about his experience of living as a foreigner in a HDB in Woodlands here, Peter Breitkreutz, takes us through his own experience of buying a HDB flat as a Singapore Permanent Resident. Last time, he looked at financing your purchase, here he talks about engaging a property agent to source your new property for you.


(Image courtesy of Singapore Tourism Board)

Step 3: Engaging a Property Agent Finding a property agent who you feel comfortable with may be easier said than done. The introduction of the new regulations has undoubtedly helped reduce the number of ‘part-time’ agents from the market, but you will find many that are unresponsive, or not ‘attuned’ to your requirements. Sites such as iProperty.com Singapore are a good starting place, they are packed full of agents and contacts, and especially as they can help you find agents that specialise in certain districts. Alternately, you could contact some of the bigger companies and engage one of their people.

I strongly recommend that you engage more than just one agent. We worked with about four or five, so as to keep the options open and increase the viewing and selection of apartments available. The property agent gets paid only if they make a sale and will charge you 1% of the sale price (+7% GST) as their fee. Note that the seller will generally have to pay their own property agent 2% (+7% GST) as their fee).

As an aside – we were extremely fortunate in that one of the agents that we engaged (and the one that found us our ‘dream’ apartment which fitted our specifications), was a ‘friend of a friend’. Throughout the entire process he went out of his way to go above and beyond what we expected in terms of service. I think this kind of agent is a rare breed indeed and, judging from what I’ve heard from others, may be difficult to find!

Once you’ve found the agent(s) who both have properties that match your criteria and you feel comfortable using, lets look at selecting and optioning to purchase a property.

Read more of this series:

Part 1: Budget and Specifications
Part 2: Financing
Part 4: Purchasing
Part 5: HDB, Legal and Taking Possession

Read more from this author…   Peter Breitkreutz is an Australian living and working in Singapore. To read more about him, check out his award-winning blog at http://www.aussiepete.com/.

Find a HDB for you… For the most authoritative and comprehensive listing of HDB properties for sale or rent, go to http://www.iproperty.com.sg/hdb/

Australian expatriate and award-winning blogger, who wrote about his experience of living as a foreigner in a HDB in Woodlands here, Peter Breitkreutz, takes us through his own experience of buying a HDB flat as a Singapore Permanent Resident. Previously, he discussed engaging a property agent, here he looks at selecting a property and securing an option to purchase


(Image courtesy of Singapore Tourism Board)

Step 4: Select a Property to Purchase OK – let’s go shopping! The agents should provide you with a schedule (preferably including many apartments in one day) for viewing of various flat. This is where ensuring that the agents have taken on board your specifications and requirements is really important. Be sure that the agents do not take you to view apartments that do not fit your specifications – we wasted a lot of time looking at apartments that were just not suited to us. They were too old, weren’t corner blocks, didn’t match our budget, and there is nothing more frustrating than wasting your time in this manner.

I strongly recommend that you view as many apartments as possible that fit your requirements. In this way you will be able to get a ‘baseline’ from which to compare prices in locations. 

Once you have found the property that you want to purchase, the next stage will be the seller providing you with an “Option to Purchase” (OTP).

Step 5: Option to Purchase (OTP)
An Option to Purchase is the right given by seller to an intending purchaser to buy the property at a specified price within a specified period of time). To receive the OTP, a fee is payable (maximum of $1,000) and the OTP will have an expiry date and time in which the OTP needs to be ‘exercised’. Once this is received and the fee paid, the seller cannot offer the property to any other potential buyer.

 To proceed, the OTP needs to be exercised before the expiry date. This is done by the buyer and seller both signing the final page of the OTP (acceptance). A fee is also payable at this stage (maximum of $5,000). Once the OTP has been executed, the buyer and seller are bound in a legal agreement for the purchase transaction.

The OTP expiry time is usually one week from the time that the option is offered by the seller. This time should be used to finalize the loan or mortgage at the bank. A copy of the OTP (and official valuation) needs to be furnished to the banking institution and the loan will go through the formal approval process. Once approved, the bank will provide you with a “Letter of Offer”. This will also have an expiry date, and once signed will also become a legally binding agreement to accept the loan. When exercising the OTP, the seller or their agent will request to see a copy of the banks “Letter of Offer”.

All fees paid in the OTP process will form a part of the deposit. For example, you are borrowing money from the bank for a $400K (valuation = sale price) property and the cash (deposit) amount is 20% ($80K). If you have paid $1000 when receiving the OTP and $5,000 when exercising the right to purchase, the balance of the deposit to be paid is $74,000.

Remember, if the sale price is more than the valuation price, then the difference must be paid in cash along with the deposit. When looking at apartments to purchase, the seller will generally show you the official valuation report, and the price of the apartment will be described in terms of over or above valuation. For example, it may say the price is $450K and that it is $10K over valuation, or $20K under valuation, etc) There are a number of factors that will effect the purchase price versus the seller valuation, and usually this is negotiable to some extent.

Having selected a property and taken up the option to purchase, let’s now look at meeting with HDB, engaging legal representation, and taking possession of your new property.

Read more of this series:

Part 1: Budget and Specifications
Part 2: Financing
Part 3: Engaging a Property Agent
Part 5: HDB, Legal and Taking Possession

Read more from this author…   Peter Breitkreutz is an Australian living and working in Singapore. To read more about him, check out his award-winning blog at http://www.aussiepete.com/.

Find a HDB for you… For the most authoritative and comprehensive listing of HDB properties for sale or rent, go to http://sg.yfittopostblog.com/2010/10/19/an-expat-at-home-in-the-heartlands/www.iproperty.com.sg/HDB.

Australian expatriate and award-winning blogger, who wrote about his experience of living as a foreigner in a HDB in Woodlands here, Peter Breitkreutz, takes us through his own experience of buying a HDB flat as a Singapore Permanent Resident. In the last article, he looked at selecting a property, here he discusses how to finance the purchase of a property.


 (Sengkang Sculpture Park. Image courtesy of Singapore Tourism Board)

STEP 2: Financing Once you have decided on your budget, you may (or may not) require a loan from a financial institution to mortgage your property. Most banks and institutions in Singapore will offer up to 80% of the property value (or sale price, whichever is lower). The remainder will need to be paid by cash. It’s common sense, but the less you borrow and the more you pay upfront, the less you will pay in the long term.

Over Valuation
One feature of the Singapore property market is ‘over valuation’, where the seller may put a price on their property at a higher value than the one determined by HDB. If you end up securing a property that is ‘over valuation’ (e.g., valued by HDB at $450K, but you are buying for the seller’s valuation of $470K = ‘$20K over valuation’), the over valuation amount will also need to be paid in cash.

 Shop around to get the best deal, in terms of interest rates, length of repayment, etc. Make sure to look at all features of the mortgage deal on offer, for example, many banks will offer a subsidy off the legal fees that you will incur later in the process as part of the package.

After going through the process myself, I have my own bias as to which financial institutions offer the best packages and service – which I will not state this here for fear of risking passing my bias on. I will say that you should be broad with your scope and check out as many as you can.

Once you have determined your ‘preferred’ bank – and remember you are not locked in at this stage to any institution – get the bank to give you an ‘in-principal’ approval for your budgeted loan amount. (Unlike many other countries, once a bank gives you this ‘in principal’ agreement, it is highly likely that there will be no problems having the loan approved when the time comes). The bank will require a copy of your – and your partner’s – identity card, along with your CPF statement and transaction history. Both of these can be accessed online from the CPF website, using your SingPass, here.

Agents and Bankers When you have engaged an estate agent, and the sale is almost determined, the agent may well try and ‘push’ his or her own affiliated bankers on you, since they get a commission on this business. Once again, by all means check it out and compare to others – you may find that the ease of having the estate agent act on your behalf to organize everything is beneficial or convenient.

Now that you have the finances taken care of, lets discuss the whys and wherefores of engaging a property agent. Of course, many people may well engage a property agent before they deal with their finances, but this is the order that I found my property.

Read more of this series:

Part 1: Budget and Specifications
Part 3: Engaging A Property Agent
Part 4: Purchasing
Part 5: HDB, Legal and Taking Possession
 

Read more from this author…   Peter Breitkreutz is an Australian living and working in Singapore. To read more about him, check out his award-winning blog at http://www.aussiepete.com/.

Looking for a home loan mortgage… go to http://www.iproperty.com.sg/financing/

Find a HDB for you… For the most authoritative and comprehensive listing of HDB properties for sale or rent, go to http://www.iproperty.com.sg/hdb/.