It has been an intense week on the property front for us. We sold our 2 bedroom apartment earlier in the year and have been renting a 3 bedroom apartment since then as we couldn’t find a bigger place to buy in time. We have been viewing properties for about 2 years now after finding out my wife was pregnant in 2019. We knew our 2 bedroom apartment in terms of size and location would not be suitable for a growing family to stay in. Not having another bedroom and smaller living & dining areas meant it can get cramped when both of us were working from home. There was also no easy access to amenities (food, groceries & big parks) and transport nodes (mrt, buses & expressways). Over the course of 2 years, we viewed a number of properties in various developments and areas on the East side of Singapore, specifically Districts 14, 15 and 16. Closer to my wife’s parents but not too far from mine.
These were our ideal requirements for the development:
- Walking distance to amenities (food, groceries & big parks)
- Walking distance to public transport (mrt, buses)
- Easy access to ECP & KPE expressways to access my alumni primary school and close to a good primary school as an alternative
- Full condo facilities (pools, gym, tennis courts & guardhouse)
- Does not need to be new but not too old (less than 20 years from TOP)
- Does not have to be freehold if most of the above conditions can be met
- Good to have enbloc potential if leasehold
These were our ideal requirements for the 3 bedroom apartment:
- Easy access from basement carpark
- Minimum size of 1,300 sqft
- Squarish layout with decent size kitchen, dining & living areas, toilets and bedrooms
- Well-maintained (ideally home owner occupied majority of the time and have not been tenanted out much)
- Original condition (so we can renovate to our taste & the owner does not over-price the unit to try and make up for their renovation costs)
- High floor with a nice view when looking out from the balcony and does not face another block in front
- Does not blow such a big hole in our finances that we can’t recover from
As you can imagine, it took us a while to narrow down our search to the development and unit we are currently renting in that could somewhat meet these requirements. Only problem was that the supply of available units for sale is tight and they tend to get snapped up when listed at a reasonable price. Bearing in mind we are in a property upcycle and seller’s market especially for larger sized units. Simply because units of new launches are getting smaller with higher price psf. And growing families with kids prefer bigger apartments to stay in. Not forgetting a permanent flexible work from home/office arrangement going forward means a lot more contact time between the family members. Best way to reduce friction is to increase the living space per person (up to a certain point of course).
For the past few months, I have been getting some alerts on PropertyGuru about available 3 bedroom apartments for sale in the development. There were only a few that met the above requirements and were over-priced. I suppose the owners were looking to test the property market to see the kind of prices their units can fetch. After all, the price psf of surrounding developments have been going up and it’s possible to squeeze more out of the buyers. Last weekend, I had an alert on PropertyGuru and it was the first reasonably priced unit I saw. Curious to find out more about the listing, I arranged for a viewing with the property agent and discussed with him in more detail about the listing.
Turns out the owners are well to do and already have 1 property each between the husband and wife. They are staying in an even bigger place in the area and are just renting out the unit waiting for a good time to sell. Since they want to move to another area altogether and we are in a property upcycle, they are looking to sell the unit now to free up the name of the husband or wife for the new property. Just imagine, it wasn’t because they needed the proceeds from the sale to buy that property. It was because there’s no available name of the husband or wife to do so. Got to admit, must be nice to have rich people problems sometimes.
Anyway, the owners didn’t want a long and dragged out sale process with viewings that are difficult to do because of Covid and tenant restrictions. Once a credible and concrete offer that meets their minimum sale price lands on the table, they are willing to close the deal. To be fair, I tried the usual negotiating techniques by starting low and gradually raising the offer price. But I quickly realised the odds were against me. There were already other potential buyers lining up to view the property with a few starting to make verbal offers. While it’s true that I cannot confirm this because it was told to me by the property agent, I know this from past experience when viewing previous units for sale and rent in the development.
I could tell the owners were just going to wait it out for their minimum sale price to be met if they have to. Although they don’t like the hassle of an extended sale process, they didn’t need the money but wanted a certain profit number. I just could not negotiate them down. In the end, I gave in and offered their minimum sale price. While not over-priced like the other units I have viewed, it is still a high price to pay to enjoy the life we want. Since the situation is still evolving, watch this space as I try to move the process to the next steps of issuing the Option To Purchase (OTP) and applying for a housing loan.