Source: Housing & Development Board, 27 July 2026
On 28 July 2026, HDB and the Ministry of National Development removed the 15-month wait-out period, with immediate effect. The wait applied to private property owners, and former owners, who buy an HDB resale flat without a grant or an HDB loan. If that's you, you can now buy without waiting, whatever your age and whatever the flat size.
A wait-out period is a set time you must wait before you can buy a flat. The 15-month one started on 30 September 2022, as part of a package of property cooling measures.
It covered non-subsidised resale flats. These are resale flats bought without a housing grant. From 28 July 2026, private property owners and former owners can buy one with no wait. The one condition is that they don't take an HDB housing loan.
So if you pay without a grant and without an HDB loan, the 15 months are gone. If you need a grant or an HDB loan, your wait hasn't changed.
| What you buy | Before 28 July 2026 | From 28 July 2026 |
|---|---|---|
| Resale flat with no grant and no HDB loan | 15-month wait | No wait |
| The same flat, if you're a citizen aged 55 or above moving to a 4-room or smaller flat | No wait | No wait |
| Subsidised HDB flat, resale flat with a grant, or EC from a developer | 30-month wait | 30-month wait |
| Any flat bought with an HDB housing loan | 30-month wait | 30-month wait |
If you still own a private home when you buy the flat, you must sell it within six months of completing the purchase. This covers private homes in Singapore and overseas.
Use our private property sale proceeds calculator to estimate the cash your sale leaves you.
On stamp duty, IRAS fully remits, or waives, the Additional Buyer's Stamp Duty (ABSD) on an HDB flat if you or a joint buyer is a Singapore Citizen. It does this automatically once HDB approves the purchase. You don't need to apply to IRAS or HDB.
Before, Singapore citizens aged 55 and above were exempt from the wait. But that only held if they moved from a private home to a 4-room or smaller resale flat.
That limit is gone. National Development Minister Chee Hong Tat said private property owners "of all ages will no longer face a wait-out period", for a resale flat of any size.
He announced the change in his opening address at the Singapore Economic Review Conference. That's according to a Straits Times report carried by The Star.
If your parents own a private home and are thinking of moving to an HDB resale flat, the age and size limits no longer apply to them.
Nothing changed for subsidised purchases. The 30-month wait-out stays in place if you plan to do any of these:
So the HDB loan matters on its own. A resale flat bought without a grant still comes with the 30-month wait if you take an HDB housing loan for it.
Use our BTO vs resale HDB calculator to put the two routes side by side.
HDB's Resale Price Index, its measure of resale flat prices, fell 0.1% in the first quarter of 2026. It fell another 0.3% in the second quarter.
Before that, prices grew slowly or not at all for five quarters in a row. That ran from the last quarter of 2024 to the last quarter of 2025.
Yearly price growth also slowed, from 10.4% in 2022 to 2.9% in 2025, The Star reported.
Supply is rising too. More flats are reaching their Minimum Occupation Period (MOP), the five years owners must live in a flat before they can sell it.
HDB said about 8,000 flats reached their MOP in 2025. It expects 13,500 in 2026, 15,000 in 2027 and 19,500 in 2028.
The change helps these buyers, as long as they buy a resale flat with no grant and no HDB loan:
Nothing changes if you hold a valid HDB Flat Eligibility (HFE) letter and your plans are the same.
Nothing changes either for buyers of a subsidised flat or an EC from a developer. The same goes for anyone using a housing grant or an HDB loan. For all of them, the 30-month wait-out stays.
If you're planning a move from a private home to a resale flat, check these points first:
To see how a resale flat's price is set, read our guide to HDB valuation and resale flat prices.
Yes, if it's a non-subsidised resale flat and you don't take an HDB housing loan. You must then sell your private property, in Singapore or overseas, within six months of completing the flat purchase.
Yes. It still applies if you buy a subsidised HDB flat, a resale flat with a housing grant or an EC unit from a developer. It also applies if you take an HDB housing loan.
IRAS fully remits ABSD on an HDB flat if you or a joint buyer is a Singapore Citizen. The remission is automatic once HDB approves the purchase, so you don't apply to IRAS or HDB.
Not if the letter is valid and your purchase plans haven't changed. If your HFE application is still being processed, HDB will update your eligibility status for you, so no action is needed.
Resale prices fell 0.1% in the first quarter of 2026 and 0.3% in the second. HDB also expects more flats to reach their MOP, with 13,500 due in 2026.
This is general financial information for Singapore, not personal financial advice. Figures change, so verify current rates against the official sources above before acting. See our full disclaimer.
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