Private residential property owners who purchase a non-subsidised HDB resale flat without an HDB housing loan will no longer be subject to the 15-month wait-out period, (Picture: Samuel Isaac Chua/EdgeProp Singapore)
Private housing owners who sell their property will no longer have to wait 15 months before buying an HDB resale flat. On July 28, HDB announced that private residential property owners who purchase a non-subsidised HDB resale flat without an HDB housing loan will no longer be subject to the 15-month wait-out period, with immediate effect.
The move follows several quarters of price moderation in the HDB resale market, said the public housing agency. The HDB Resale Price Index saw two consecutive quarters of decline this year, falling 0.1% q-o-q in 1Q2026 and 0.3% q-o-q in 2Q2026. The decline comes on top of five consecutive quarters of slower or no price growth from 4Q2024 to 4Q2025.
HDB added that the stabilisation in the resale market is further supported by a larger number of new flats that will be completing their minimum occupation period (MOP) and entering the resale market over the next few years. 8,000 Build-to-Order flats reached their MOP in 2025, with HDB estimating the figure to increase to 13,500 in 2026, 15,000 in 2027 and 19,500 in 2028.
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The wait-out period was first introduced in September 2022 as part of a package of property cooling measures for the HDB resale market that included a cut in the HDB loan-to-value (LTV) limit to 80% and an interest rate floor of 3% for HDB loans. The LTV limit was further reduced to 75% in August 2024.
Seniors aged 55 and above were exempted from the 15-month wait-out period if they moved from their private property to a four-room or smaller non-subsidised flat.
In May 2025, Minister for National Development Chee Hong Tat said that the government may remove the wait-out period if resale prices in the HDB market continued to moderate.
The 15-month wait-out period has been largely successful in tempering purchases of five-room or larger resale flats by private property owners, says Lee Sze Teck, senior director of data analytics at Huttons Asia. Data compiled by the agency show that the transaction volumes for five-room and executive/multi-gen HDB resale flats eased from 6,951 and 1,946 in 2022 to 5,966 and 1,539 units in 2025, respectively.
With the wait-out period now abolished, Lee expects more private property owners to enter the market for five-room and larger flats. While this may boost resale market activity, a spike in HDB resale prices is "unlikely", given that first-time buyers have more options to choose from, ranging from BTO flats and executive condos to private residential homes, he adds.
Eugene Lim, key executive officer at ERA Singapore, views the government's decision to remove the wait-out period as a "measured response to a more balanced HDB resale market". "It gives private homeowners greater flexibility to right-size, while the larger pipeline of flats reaching MOP should help the market absorb the additional demand and preserve overall market stability," he adds.
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Lim expects the change to unlock some pent-up demand for resale flats, particularly for larger, newer and well-located homes. Additionally, the greater flexibility may facilitate activity in the private resale housing market, as owners dispose of their existing properties.