Announced in February and to begin next Tuesday, is an enhanced Re-Offer of Balance Flats (ROF) scheme which will allow applicants to select from a rolling pool of available HDB flats left from previous launches as soon as 1 day after submitting an application.
Enhanced Re-offer of Balance Flats scheme to commence on 18 June
123 flats will be offered under the new rolling basis Re-offer of Balance Flats (RBF) scheme next Tuesday.
The flats are unsold units from previous sales exercises and are available for booking anytime. Leftover units will continue to add on to this pool unless launches were completely booked.
HDB, Bukit Batok West Ave 2. Picture: iProperty
The schemes preceding this new one were the Sales of Balance Flat (SBF) scheme and Re-offer of Balance Flats (RBF) scheme which will still be available.
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The latter is only made available twice a year in February and August.
However, under this new scheme, homeowners have to wait till applications close before finding out if they are successful before securing a date for booking.
This could considerably increase the waiting time for those who are urgently in need of a place to live.
Under the new scheme, buyers can view the available flat listing online, submit an online application and receive a booking date as soon as the next day.
Buyers looking for flats in mature estates may have something to look forward to as 105 out of these 123 units are in towns such as Ang Mo Kio, Bukit Merah and Toa Payoh.
The rest of the units are in Bukit Batok and Jurong West.
228 Bukit Batok East. Picture: iProperty
Restrictions such as ethnicity quota still apply
There are however some restrictions to next week’s ROF exercise:
- Ethnicity quota – Only 26 flats are available to Chinese buyers, 115 for Malays and 119 for Indians and other races.
- Size of flat – Most of the units are 3-room flats or 3Gen flats. The former may be small for young families or couples hoping to start one, while the latter requires parents to live with their married children.
23 four-bedroom units, 20 five-bedroom units, 3 two-room flexi flats and 3 executive flats will make up the rest of the units in next week’s exercise.
Buyers seem to welcome this new scheme though some are not hopeful of selecting the desired unit from a narrow pool of leftover units.
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