The year has begun on an upbeat note for the Housing Board resale market.
More HDB flats changed hands in January compared with December and prices inched up by 0.5 per cent.
In all, 1,920 HDB resale flats were sold last month, 3.3 per cent more than in December, flash estimates from real estate portal SRX showed yesterday. The figure represented a turnaround, a reversal of the 3 per cent slide in December from the preceding month.
It was also 23.1 per cent more than the 1,560 units sold in January last year.
Compared with January 2019, prices went up by 0.3 per cent last month.
Flats in non-mature estates rose by 0.8 per cent while flats in mature estates fell by 0.1 per cent compared with December.
The most expensive resale flat that changed hands last month was an executive apartment unit in Lorong 2 Toa Payoh, which sold for $1.025 million. An executive maisonette unit in Hougang Street 21 went for $853,000, the highest price in a non-mature estate.
There were also four HDB resale flats which transacted for at least $1 million last month.
Resale flat buyers last month "underpaid", based on what SRX estimates to be the market value for flats. The overall median transaction over X-value (TOX) was a negative $500 last month, a decrease of $1,500 compared with December.
TOX measures how much a buyer is overpaying (positive value) or underpaying (negative value) for a property based on SRX's computer-generated market value. The data includes only districts with more than 10 resale transactions.
Flats in Woodlands recorded the highest median TOX at a positive $10,500, followed by flats in Bukit Batok, at a positive $6,800.
Meanwhile, flats in Punggol recorded the lowest median TOX, at a negative $6,500, followed by flats in Toa Payoh, at a negative $6,100.
OrangeTee & Tie research head Christine Sun said last month's figures might be due to the festive season.
"Some buyers could have returned after the year-end holidays. Those who are in urgent need of a home may have preferred to settle their purchase before the Chinese New Year as house viewings are harder to arrange during the festive period," she said.
Around 5,902 flats will be eligible to join the HDB resale market in the next three months as these units approach their five-year minimum occupation period.
