High price of DBSS flats mean buyers may have to spend a significant portion of their lives paying off loans THE recent launch of City View @ Boon Keng and the identification by the Housing and Development Board (HDB) of three more sites in Simei, Toa Payoh and Bedok for such developments has taken the price of public housing to a new level. When compared to other private properties in the area, it seems...
Finance
A consumer finance company in Japan recently started offering lower mortgage interest rates to “intelligent” customers. One might wonder if banks here have missed a trick, given the premium that society here places on “intelligence”. GE Consumer Finance Company, a subsidiary of an American industrial and financial conglomerate, is giving discounts to people who have good English or computer...
You think you know the bank interest rate you are paying when you take out a home loan — but a year or so later, you discover to your shock that it has ballooned, and you should have read the fine print more closely. Such scenarios, which were at the heart of numerous gripes from Today readers last year, should be a thing of the past, when new guidelines by the Association of Banks in Singapore (ABS)...
Being an Australian expatriate living and working in Singapore for the past 10 years, I have found myself in a position where the rental on my current condo unit will be increased from $1,900 a month to $3,500. Most of us know that paying this much in rental is nothing short of pointless and a complete waste of hard-earned money. So, like almost all of my expatriate friends, I have decided to buy rather...
With the property market booming and financing getting cheaper, Standard Chartered Bank is moving aggressively in Singapore’s mortgage space. Over the past week alone, the foreign lender has launched two home loans pegged to interest rates that are publicly available. Stanchart’s latest offer, announced yesterday, is a mortgage tied to the three-month Singapore dollar swap offer rate (SOR), which...
Banks in Singapore are benefiting from the sizzling property market. Not surprisingly, there has been an increase in the number of home loan applications. And with the outlook for the property sector remaining buoyant, market watchers say they expect interest rates to hold steady. Citibank, for example, is reporting an increase of more than 20% in loans growth. "We have seen a significant increase in...
Home owners should first decide the amount of mortgage cover and the premiums they can pay The recent case of Madam Kok Pooi Leng, who lost her semi-detached house after her husband was killed last year, has thrown into the spotlight the importance of mortgage insurance. Madam Kok’s house was repossessed by the bank last year because she had not been able to make loan repayments on the outstanding...
Falling energy prices and a potential slowdown in the United States economy could bode well for Singapore homebuyers. Bankers and economists have agreed that interest rates may have peaked and are beginning to show signs of a decline. The key barometer to take note of is the Singapore Interbank Offered Rates (Sibor), which often influences other rates. Currently, the Sibor stands at around...
When purchasing a property, considerable attention should be paid to picking the right form of financing available in the market. To help buyers choose the right financing, Mr Gary Tan (picture), an assistant vice president with DBS Bank's Consumer Banking Group, has shortlisted four main questions a potential homeowner should ask before applying for a home loan. Firstly, the potential buyer has to...