School holidays, BTO slow down HDB resale activity in June

More million-dollar transactions drove prices higher.

School holidays and the June Build-To-Order (BTO) exercise helped slow down transactions in the HDB resale market last month but property analysts said the rising prices signal strong demand.

Huttons’ Senior Director for Data Analytics, Lee Sze Teck, said last month’s HDB resale volume declined 13% MoM mainly due to the school holidays and the June BTO exercise.

Despite this, Lee said the overall demand for HDB resale flats is still strong, especially in mature estates that are close to a Prime Location Housing (PLH) BTO. 

Another indicator is the growing appeal of flats aged up to five years, which made up nearly 12% of all the transactions last month, compared to just less than 10% the month prior, he said.

Wong Siew Ying, Head of Research and Content at PropNex, said that they also saw a greater proportion of resale flats sold at higher prices last month, including those resold at prices ranging from $800,000 to $900,000, $900,000 to $1m.

This contributed to the overall 1.8% MoM uptick in resale prices last month.

“Furthermore, the increase in million-dollar transactions can be linked to robust consumer confidence and positive buying sentiment driven by recent improvements in Singapore's economy and job market outlook,” Christine Sun, Chief Researcher and Strategist at OrangeTee Group, said in a separate note.

“This trend may be more apparent among the upper-middle-income group, who have experienced consistent wage growth and may have the financial capability to pay higher prices for attractive resale flat,” Sun added.

For the entire 2024, Huttons raised its HDB resale price forecast to 8% from just 3% to 5% previously.