FACED with high capital inflows and a roaring property market after the global financial crisis, the Singapore government began to put in place a series of property cooling measures, starting in September 2009. In the face of three rounds of quantitative easing by the US Federal Reserve and persistent, record-low interest rates, six further rounds of cooling measures followed, till January 2013. The measures included reductions in loan-to-value limits; the introduction of seller stamp duties (SSD), the rates of which were subsequently increased and the tenures extended; the imposition of additional buyers' stamp duties (ABSD), with differential rates for Singaporeans and foreigners, which rates were also later increased; and limits on maximum loan tenures.

In June 2013, the Monetary Authority of Singapore introduced a Total Debt Servicing Ratio (TDSR) framework which capped total borrowings at 60 per cent of qualifying income, based on stringent imputed interest rates.

These successive measures, which were introduced in a calibrated fashion, were timely and served their purpose. After increasing at 12 per cent per year during 2010 and 2011, private residential property prices slowed to 3 per cent in 2012 and then to one per cent last year. In the final quarter of 2013, they started to fall. HDB resale prices have also fallen, since the second half of last year.