October launch of 870-unit Berlayar BTO to kick-start Greater Southern Waterfront revamp
The new housing estate on the former Keppel Club site will offer 7,000 Build-To-Order flats and 3,000 private homes
[SINGAPORE] The new Berlayar estate, coming up on the former Keppel Club site, will have 7,000 public housing flats, up from the previously announced 6,000 flats.
The Housing & Development Board’s (HDB) first Build-To-Order (BTO) project on the 48-hectare (ha) site – roughly half the size of Bidadari – will be launched at the next BTO sales exercise in October. It will yield 870 units of two to four-room flats, as well as 200 public rental flats within a single block.
“Berlayar is just one of many exciting new developments to come,” said Minister for National Development Chee Hong Tat on Tuesday (Sep 23) at the HDB Awards ceremony celebrating excellence in design, engineering and construction in public housing.
“As we build more quality homes, including homes in attractive locations, we will keep these flats affordable and accessible, so that Singaporeans at every life stage can find a home that meets their needs.”
A broader strategy to improve the geographical distribution of public housing is bringing new HDB supply to desirable residential neighbourhoods in central areas. The October BTO sales exercise will also see the first public housing flats at Mount Pleasant in the Thomson area.
The Berlayar estate is located just outside the Labrador Nature Reserve, in the Telok Blangah/Harbourfront area and close to Sentosa. Residents can expect to have views of the Southern Ridges and the coast.
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The first BTO project, Berlayar Residences, is likely to fall under the Prime category of new flats and be subject to a 10-year minimum occupation period as well as tighter restrictions on resale and rental.
PropNex head of research and content Wong Siew Ying expects the project to be a “headliner”, with prices estimated to range from S$250,000 to S$360,000 for two-room flats, S$420,000 to S$530,000 for three-room flats, and S$590,000 to S$790,000 for four-room flats.
Resale prices of HDB flats in the Telok Blangah area ranged from S$308,000 to S$1.13 million in the first eight months of 2025, according to PropNex data.
“Being on such a prime site near the city, we expect a higher amount of subsidies may be offered to keep the prices (affordable),” Wong added. She reckons the subsidy recovery rate could be raised beyond the 11 per cent and 12 per cent clawback rates for Prime flats in the previous BTO exercise in July.
The last BTO launch in the area was Telok Blangah Beacon in May 2021, which drew 4,078 applicants – an application rate of 23 times, said Wong.
In Bukit Merah, ERA key executive Eugene Lim noted that the latest BTO launches were Alexandra Peaks and Alexandra Vista in July. Prices for the Prime projects ranged from S$218,000 to S$723,000, with a clawback rate of 11 per cent. The two projects, which have an estimated waiting time of 47 to 56 months, drew around 3,500 applicants vying for 1,107 units as at Jul 30.
Lim also pointed out that the July BTO exercise saw 8,169 applicants contend for 1,578 four-room units across four Prime projects in Bukit Merah, Clementi and Toa Payoh.
This worked out to an application rate of 5.2, even with subsidy clawback rates at 12 per cent at the Clementi project, Lim said. He expects to see similar demand for the Berlayar project.
Compared with a typical four-room Prime HDB flat, a private condominium unit of roughly the same size (926 square feet) in the area could cost about S$1.6 million, going by transactions at Reflections at Keppel Bay this year, Realion Group chief researcher and strategist Christine Sun pointed out.
The median price of transactions at the 99-year-leasehold Reflections at Keppel Bay was S$1,721 per square foot (psf) in the first eight months of the year.
New homes
Another 3,000 private homes are planned for Berlayar estate, an extension of Bukit Merah, bringing the total number of homes in the area to 10,000 units.
HDB said the timelines for other housing parcels in the estate, including their completion schedules, were still being finalised.
The first parcel for private residential development in the Berlayar estate was released for sale under the first-half 2025 government land sales programme (GLS) in late June. The tender closes on Nov 4.
The 99-year leasehold parcel along Telok Blangah Road spans 13,688.9 square metres of land, with a maximum gross floor area of 64,338 sq m. It will yield around 745 private homes.
Market watchers expect to see four to six bidders for the plot, with a top bid of S$1,200 to S$1,300 psf per plot ratio, as it is the area’s first GLS site in 35 years.
The first Berlayar HDB blocks – between 19 and 46-storeys high – will be built at least 5.2 metres above mean sea level to provide “sufficient protection from rising sea levels”. Most homes will be within a 10-minute walk from Labrador Park or Telok Blangah MRT stations, said HDB.
Up to 10 ha – around 20 per cent of the site area – will be set aside for green spaces, including green corridors that will connect the Southern Ridges and Labrador Nature Reserve.
A new 6.5-ha Berlayer Creek Nature Park will buffer and extend existing mangroves in the area, said HDB.
First announced in 2013, the Greater Southern Waterfront stretches from Pasir Panjang to Marina East, and includes Sentosa and Pulau Brani.
The Greater Southern Waterfront area encompasses 2,000 ha of land – six times the size of Marina Bay and twice the size of Punggol. It is set to become a mixed-use waterfront precinct with leisure and tourism developments.
Development will take place in phases over more than 20 years, starting with the former Pasir Panjang Power District, Keppel Club site and Mount Faber in the next five to 10 years, authorities said.
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