HDB Resale Atlas

30 years of HDB resale data

What happens when you track every HDB resale from 1990 to 2026-01? This is an attempt to find patterns in pricing, location premiums, and how policy changes actually affected the market.

Total transactions969,748
Towns covered27
Latest full year2025

Price growth since 1990

9.2x

About 6.6% per year (CAGR).

Peak activity year

1999

57,782 recorded resales.

Prices over time

Both charts show the same thing: prices go up. Per-square-meter prices climb faster than you'd expect, while transaction volume swings wildly depending on market conditions and policy changes.

Average price per sqm

Monthly average, SGD per sqm

19901999200820172026S$731S$2.3kS$3.9kS$5.5kS$7.0k

Transaction volume

Monthly resales

199019992008201720263631.9k3.4k4.9k6.5k

Accounting for inflation

The gap between these two lines is inflation eating away at your money. Real prices (adjusted for CPI) still climb, just not as dramatically as the nominal numbers suggest.

Average price per sqm

Nominal vs CPI-adjusted

19901999200820172026S$731S$2.3kS$3.9kS$5.5kS$7.0k
Nominal
Real (CPI-adjusted)

How spread out are prices?

Not everyone pays the median. This shows the middle 50% range each year—basically, how much variance there is in what people actually pay per square meter.

Annual price distribution

Middle 50% band with median

19901999200820172026S$593S$2.4kS$4.1kS$5.9kS$7.7k

Which towns are expensive?

Queenstown, Bukit Merah, and Central Area top the list. Not surprising—they're central, mature, and close to everything. The more interesting question is which towns punched above their weight and which ones lagged behind.

Data through 2026-01. Last full year: 2025.

Top towns by price per sqm

Average across the full dataset

PUNGGOL
S$5.2k
CENTRAL AREA
S$4.7k
SENGKANG
S$4.6k
BUKIT MERAH
S$4.3k
BUKIT TIMAH
S$4.3k
SEMBAWANG
S$4.1k
BISHAN
S$4.1k
QUEENSTOWN
S$4.0k
MARINE PARADE
S$4.0k
KALLANG/WHAMPOA
S$4.0k

Flat types

Bigger flats cost more in absolute terms (obvious), but the per-square-meter price is surprisingly similar across flat types. A 5-room isn't much more expensive per sqm than a 3-room.

Average resale price by flat type

All years combined

1 ROOM
S$68.7k
2 ROOM
S$178.5k
3 ROOM
S$211.3k
4 ROOM
S$344.3k
5 ROOM
S$446.4k
EXECUTIVE
S$525.8k
MULTI-GENERATION
S$537.6k

Average price per sqm by flat type

All years combined

1 ROOM
S$2.2k
2 ROOM
S$3.9k
3 ROOM
S$3.1k
4 ROOM
S$3.6k
5 ROOM
S$3.7k
EXECUTIVE
S$3.6k
MULTI-GENERATION
S$3.3k

Flat models

HDB has built dozens of flat models over the years. Some are clearly more desirable than others—whether because of design, layout, or just when they were built.

Top flat models by price per sqm

Average across all transactions

Type S1
S$10.8k
Type S2
S$10.6k
Premium Apartment Loft
S$9.5k
DBSS
S$8.2k
2-room
S$7.8k
3Gen
S$6.3k
Terrace
S$6.0k
PREMIUM APARTMENT
S$4.7k

Lease age and floor level

Older leases are cheaper (duh), but the curve is steep. As for floors, higher is better, and the premium starts kicking in around the 10th floor.

Lease age vs price per sqm

5-year lease age buckets

015304055S$2.8kS$3.6kS$4.3kS$5.0kS$5.7k

Storey band premium

Average price per sqm by storey range

0-3
S$3.2k
10-12
S$3.4k
13-15
S$4.1k
16+
S$5.2k
4-6
S$3.3k
7-9
S$3.4k

Year-on-year changes

Sometimes prices go up while volume drops, or vice versa. These divergences usually signal something—cooling measures, policy shifts, or market uncertainty.

YoY price-per-sqm change

Annual percentage change

19912000200920172026-17.5%-0.1%17.3%34.8%52.2%

YoY transaction change

Annual percentage change

19912000200920172026-94.2%-55.4%-16.6%22.1%60.9%

Divergence years

Price and volume moving opposite directions

1997: 7.2% vs -9.0%
1998: -17.5% vs 60.9%
1999: -4.5% vs 13.1%
2000: 5.1% vs -39.7%
2001: -7.3% vs 9.2%
2003: 3.0% vs -19.7%
2005: -1.7% vs 3.2%
2007: 8.9% vs -1.6%

Being near an MRT matters

The closer you are to an MRT station, the more expensive your flat. This is Singapore—nobody wants to walk 15 minutes in the heat.

Price by distance to MRT

Closer = more expensive

Run the geocoding pipeline to enable MRT distance insights. Coverage: 0%.

Which towns appreciated most?

Some towns went from cheap to expensive over 30 years. These are the ones with the biggest price jumps from the 1990s to the 2020s.

Top gainers

Price per sqm growth from 1990s → 2020s

QUEENSTOWN
318.5%
CENTRAL AREA
290.8%
BUKIT MERAH
247.7%
KALLANG/WHAMPOA
233.0%
TOA PAYOH
221.5%
CLEMENTI
209.8%
GEYLANG
204.3%
ANG MO KIO
198.3%
BUKIT BATOK
188.1%
BEDOK
163.5%

Policy changes

The Singapore government tweaks HDB policy constantly. Here are some of the bigger moves that actually shifted market behavior.

2013-01-11
Mortgage Servicing Ratio (MSR) introduced
MSR cap announced to tighten HDB loan eligibility; measures effective 12 Jan 2013.
2019-09-10
Enhanced CPF Housing Grant
Enhanced CPF Housing Grant announced to improve affordability for first-time buyers.
2021-10-27
Prime Location Public Housing (PLH) model
PLH model launched to preserve affordability for prime locations with tighter resale conditions.
2022-09-30
15-month wait-out period
Private property owners required to wait 15 months before buying non-subsidised resale flats.
2023-09-18
Standard/Plus/Prime classification
New classification framework for BTO flats announced; to apply from 2H 2024 launches.

Notes

Data is from public HDB records, plus CPI and MRT coordinates. All prices in SGD. The 2026 numbers are obviously incomplete. MRT distances are straight-line from blocks to station exits—not walking distance. Everything here uses simple averages. No fancy weighting or adjustments.