HDB Hunt 3: Blk 224 Serangoon Ave 4 - 24th Oct 2009

Visited on 24th Oct.

Blk 224
13th floor, door-to-door.
Area: 93sqm
Price: $330,000 (valuation) + $35,000 (COV)


This house gave me quite a good feeling.


This is the view from the front door. The house appeared really neat looking.



This place is the kitchen. I don't fancy these kind of tiles as they make the house look old. It looks cosy though and isn't too long like the previous house I saw. If it's too long, it makes things a little inconvenient.



The master bedroom.



I keep feeling that the odd window at the top makes the room a little scary.




These are the other 2 bedrooms. Paul thinks that they look a bit small and squeezy, which I agree.. But the views out from the windows are not too bad..



This is the view towards the door. The living room is larger because the owners extended it. I like the open space of the living room and could imagine how I would like to make it nicer. :)

HDB Hunt 2: Blk 221 Serangoon Avenue 4 - 14th October 2009

This flat I visited myself.

Blk 221
4th floor, door-to-door, lift level (newly installed), facing a street junction
Area: 91sqm
Price: $320,000 (valuation) + $30,000 (COV)

This flat has a very odd shape. Did not have a good camera hence I did not capture the overall looks of it. I cannot envision how to put my furniture unless I break down one of the bedroom walls to create an ultra big living room.

The flat is a little scary as well as there is an old lady staying in one of the rooms. The owner is staying in a flat nearby and came to open the door for us. The place is not very clean as well (I hope just physically).

The toilet at the kitchen. Quite eerie.

Viewing into the kitchen. The furniture is in disrepair.

 This is from the kitchen entrance facing the entrance to the flat and part of the living room.

Facing the door from the living room

From the entrance of the flat to the living room and kitchen.

 

From the living room (next to the storeroom) to the bedrooms.

From the living room to the bedrooms.

HDB Hunt 1: Blk 335 Serangoon Avenue 3 - 2nd October 2009

This was the first flat we visited on 2nd Oct 09 in the evening.

Blk 335 Serangoon Avenue 3
7th Floor Corridor Flat (lift level)
Area:  97sqm
Price: $320,000 (V) + $40,000(COV)

The owner renovated this house about 10 years ago. Quite a good condition.

This is the master bedroom. Room is quite pleasant except it is quite squeezy. There are quite a number of mirrors. We don't really fancy the wardrobe as well.

I think this master toilet is actually quite decent after seeing the 2 houses after this.

Same master room

This room is quite spacious actually. It faces the corridor and you can see that if you leave any valuables at the cupboard, confirm will get stolen one. This will be the "OCBC" room or a study best.

The other bedroom is quite nice as well. A bit of space and the sills are not as oh-biang as outside or like most other flats.

Kitchen not too bad. Not exactly spacious and little cooking area.

A lot of living room space but hard to plan how to arrange the stuff around.

The corridor to the flat and me wearing my shoes to go off. The space there is huge.

The corridor facing into the flat. Just next to the corner flat.

Hunting for HDB

Image by krisdecurtis via Flickr

For the past month, we have been calling up and visiting some flats around our area.

This is just a short record of what we have gathered so far. If we have the time, we hope to post the reviews of the flat up so we can get a better and clearer idea of what we hope our future home would be.

Serangoon Central Area

Blk 335
Area:  97sqm
Price: $320,000 + $30,000

Blk 221
Area: 91sqm
Price: $310,000 + $30,000

Blk 224 (NG)
Area: 93sqm
Price: $330,000 + $35,000

Getting a HDB Loan

Addy and I just got our Housing Loan Eligibility letter yesterday after sending in our letter and relevant documents recent Tuesday (20Oct09). It took only 1 working day to process. I even got an sms from MyECitizen that my loan has been approved. Great!

With our combined income, we are entitled to a maximum loan of about $510,000 over 30 years with monthly payments of about $2,100. Our maximum eligible loan is based on our combined income of about $5,400 if you are keen on a ballpark figure. You can calculate your own figure from the HDB website. Link here for convenience.

I have an excel spreadsheet that calculates that the optimal loan we ought to take (from our current income) is about $260,000. This is based on a loan period of 25 years (till i am about 55 as advised by HDB) and a monthly payment of about $1,472 that does not require us to pay more outside our CPF contributions for now. Once I have made the excel file more "readable, I hope to upload it for reader's use as well.

Do note the following HDB guidelines and notes (I gathered for simplicity):
The maximum loan amount that may be granted depends on:-

(a) maximum repayment period;
The maximum loan repayment period is 65 years minus the buyer’s age or 30 years, whichever is shorter.
Buyers can fully redeem or make a partial capital repayment of the loan by giving one month’s prior written notice to HDB. For redemption after complete disbursement of loan, the buyer should pay the whole of the Principal sum then outstanding and all other monies due including interest up to the date of payment. Each partial capital repayment of the loan shall not be less than $500.

(b) applicable interest rate;
Computation of the maximum loan will be based on the prevailing interest rate which may be revised from time to time. The interest on the HDB loan will be computed on a **monthly rest basis or such other basis as the HDB may decide. The HDB concessionary interest rate is pegged at 0.1% point above CPF Ordinary Account Interest Rate. It is revised quarterly in January, April, July and October each year, in line with the revision of CPF interest rate.

(c) monthly instalments; and
This is capped at 40% of the gross monthly income.
You can use your CPF savings and /or cash to service the monthly instalments of the housing loan. The monthly instalment is payable on the first day of each month. If the instalment is not paid within the month, a late payment charge will be imposed based on the outstanding instalment as at end of the month. Any payment received by HDB will first be used to settle the outstanding late payment charges. Any balance will then be applied towards the payment of the other outstanding charges.
Buyers paying the monthly loan instalments partially or fully by cash, must pay them through GIRO.
If paying using their all their CPF, buyers must use all the available savings in their CPF Ordinary Accounts [after reserving an amount required for (1)payment of stamp, (2)registration and (3)conveyancing fees and (4)CPF Home Protection Insurance Premium (if applicable)] for the purchase of or taking over the flat before any housing loan is granted by HDB.

(d) loan ceiling.
The loan that can be granted for the purchase of an HDB flat is subject to:

Sales Type	Loan Ceiling*
Direct purchase flats	90% of the purchase price
Resale flats	90% of the resale price (market value + COV) or 90% of the market value (sometimes owners sell below valuation), whichever is lower

**monthly rest basis - Your loan interest for the current month will be calculated based on the previous month’s outstanding balance (which consists of principal and interest not paid, if any). The advantage of monthly rest is that you do not have to worry about making instalments at a certain date, as long as the payment comes in at month end.


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