Fewer foreigners bought homes in Q1

The count of non-landed homes bought by foreigners was down by 47.3%.

The December 2021 cooling measures, that imposed tax increase, may have caused the decrease in the number of non-landed homes bought by foreigners in the first quarter (Q1) of 2022, the real estate agency, OrangeTee & Tie, said in its report.

Citing Urban Redevelopment Authority data, Orange Tee said the count of non-landed homes purchased by foreigners declined by 47.3% to 147 units in Q1 2022 from 279 units in the previous quarter.

The firm’s Private Residential Sales Q1 2022 also noted that the recent cooling measures may have discouraged foreigners from purchasing homes in Singapore. Under the cooling measures imposed in December, foreigners had to pay 30% of the property price as additional buyer’s stamp duty tax, higher by 20% from the previous rate.

At a slower rate, purchases by permanent residents (PRs) declined by 21.8% from 1,059 units to 828 units over the same period.

Meanwhile, the proportion of condos bought by PRs rose on a quarterly basis from 15% in the fourth quarter of 2021 to 18.2% in Q1 2022.

As for the proportion of homes bought by foreigners, it declined slightly from 4% to 3.2%, on a quarterly basis.

In Q1 2022, the largest group of foreigners who bought non-landed properties were from Mainland China with 244, followed by Malaysia with 176, India with 128, the US with 49, and Indonesia with 42.