The Covid-19 pandemic hasn’t just put a stop to our dream of travelling to 5 different continents by the time we’re 30; it probably destroyed some people’s dreams of owning their own home by the age of 31.
Previously, the Housing Development Board (HDB) BTO projects only required 3 to 4 years to complete, especially after some genius out there discovered that stacking units like lego is infinitesimally faster than laying it brick-by-brick.
But with Covid-19 and the entire issue with Singapore’s main construction workforce, our foreign workers, the construction sector came to a crashing halt.
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While it is looking to resume slowly, HDB has warned that BTO projects will take longer to complete.
How long? Up to five years long.
New BTOs Will Take Up to 5 Years to Complete Due to COVID-19 Measures
On 12 Aug 2020, it was announced that some of the projects involved in the HDB mega-BTO sales exercise may take up to five years to build due to the various Covid-19 safety measures.
For more details on the measures, you can check out this article.
Some of you might be very familiar with one of the projects, the UrbanVille (or, what we like to call, the second-coming of Duxton@Pinnacle):
If you’re going to try your luck and get a unit here, just be prepared that out of all the projects, this particular one will take the longest.
The project needs an estimated 62 months to complete, which means you’ll probably be able to collect your keys in the second quarter of 2026.
Yes, the same year the SG-JB LRT service is supposed to be completed.
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The 1,070 unit in Costa Grove can take up to 58 months, so around the end of 2025.
For Bishan & Parc Residences @ Tengah, they’ll need between 52 and 52 months to complete.
This put their estimated completion dates in the third quarter of 2025.
On the flip side, you now have more time to save up for your renovations.
Buy Resale If In Urgent Need
Handsome Covid-19 fighter, Mr Lawrence Wong, said that he has asked HDB to try and expedite the progress of the builds.
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However, he says, they have to ensure that construction workers are kept safe.
Which is why he suggested that if you really need a house to stay in before 2025 (at the earliest), go and buy a resale flat.
First-time buyers (for resale flats) can get up to $160,000 housing grant.
In total, 7,862 units were offered by HDB in the biggest-ever sale for BTO flats, spread across 11 projects across 8 different towns.
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Yeah, like GSS except you pay a lot more than 0.99 cents and your date of delivery is in years.
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