The central bank of Singapore has announced that its current cooling measures will remain in place.
The restrictions, which were introduced eight years ago, have been cited as the reason for the cooling of the property market.
“Our key property market measures remain necessary for a stable and sustainable residential property market and to encourage household financial prudence,” the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), revealed in its annual report.
“The calibrated adjustments by the government earlier this year do not signal the start of an unwinding of the property cooling measures, as some commentators have suggested,” continued Ravi Menon, managing director of MAS.
Back in March the Singapore government began to reduce some of the restrictions, including lowering stamp duty for sellers, but Menon is adamant that they will not be removed despite the property market beginning to stabilise.
“The property market has substantially stabilized over the last three years,” Menon added.
“The risk of a renewed unsustainable surge in property prices is not trivial.”
Despite the cooling measures, property transactions in the first quarter of 2017, and during all of last year, surpassed those in 2015. In addition, developers sold 2,962 units in the first quarter – the highest take-up rate since 2013.
And, according to data from the Credit Bureau Singapore, mortgage loan applications also rose in the first quarter of this year compared to the previous quarter.
Finally, according to the NUS Singapore Residential Price Index, Singapore residential property prices rose 0.4% on-month in May.
