MND increases land supply for private homes in H2 2017

THE government will release land for up to 8,125 private residential units (including executive condo units) and 83,590 square metres gross floor area (GFA) of commercial space on both confirmed and reserve lists in the second half of this year.

This is higher than the 7,465 private housing units but lower than the 158,080 sq m GFA of commercial space for the current first-half Government Land Sales (GLS) Programme.

The Ministry of National Development (MND) said on Thursday morning that through the confirmed list it will release land for 2,840 private residential units and 26,800 sq m GFA of commercial space in the second half. Confirmed list sites are launched according to schedule regardless of demand.

On the reserve list, MND will offer land for 5,285 private residential units and 56,790 sq m GFA of commercial space, mostly for office use. Reserve-list sites are launched only upon successful application by a developer or when there is sufficient market interest in a site.

The supply of 2,840 private housing units from the confirmed list is higher than the 2,330 units from the H1 2017 confirmed list, whereas the supply of 5,285 units from the reserve list is close to the 5,135 units from the H1 2017 reserve list.

Overall, the total supply of 8,125 units from the H2 2017 GLS Programme is higher than the supply of 7,465 units from the first-half slate.

"As the demand for new private housing from home buyers continued to rise in the first half of 2017, the number of unsold private housing units in the pipeline has declined. Hence, there is a need to inject a larger supply of residential sites through the GLS Programme to ensure that there is an adequate pipeline supply of new private housing units to meet the needs of our population," the ministry added.

The second-half reserve list includes a site at Woodlands Square for a mixed-use development comprising mainly office space. "This site will allow developers to initiate the development of more office space if they assess there is demand," MND noted.

The confirmed list sites include private housing plots in Chong Kuo Road, Handy Road and Hillview Rise as well as an EC site in Sumang Walk. There will also be commercial and residential sites in Holland Road and Sengkang Central.

The new reserve list sites include a plot in Cuscaden Road.