Do Singaporeans Spend too Much on Housing?

• Main Author: PHANG, Sock Yong
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University 2013
• Subjects: housing; consumer expenditure; Singapore; Asian Studies; Public Economics; Real Estate; Urban Studies
• Online Access: https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/soe_research/1506; https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/context/soe_research/article/2505/viewcontent/Phang_2013_IPS_Presentation.pdf
• Institution: Singapore Management University

According to a 2011 IMF study, Singapore's level of government intervention in housing finance is the highest in the developed world (Slide 3). This level of intervention in housing finance has correspondingly produced the highest level of homeownership amongst advanced countries. This housing outcome is the result of our very unique HDB-CPF housing framework – an institutional framework that was established in the 1960s during the formative period of our country?s history (Slides 4 and 5). Singapore was, at that particular point in time, faced with a situation of chronic housing shortage, low homeownership rates and an underdeveloped housing mortgage sector due to the high risks involved in lending for low income housing (Slide 6).