By Khalil AdisJun 6, 2011
Khalil Adis is an experienced property writer, with in-depth knowledge of Singapore's and Malaysia's property market. During his career, he's written for Property Guru, Property Report and Property...
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His appointment comes at a crucial time when Singapore’s public housing market is witnessing a record in prices, a supply crunch and affordability issues among young couples, singles and low-income families.
So far, he has won the hearts and minds of the public (myself included) with his new housing blog that genuinely aims to gather feedback in order to solve our housing woes.
He has also won the hearts and minds of animal lovers for his compassionate approach to solve the problem of stray cats by not culling them and by asking the Housing and Development Board (HDB) to re-look its policy to allow cats in HDB flats.
Industry leaders that I have spoken to have so far applauded his moves to prioritise the housing needs of those who genuinely need help – young couples, divorcees with children and low income families.
The road ahead will not be an easy one for Minister Khaw.
He has to weigh the interest of property investors and first time homeowners while still making Singapore an attractive property investment destination for foreign investors.
This calls for a delicate balancing act as property investors do not want to see the capital values of their homes drop while first time homeowners hope that prices will drop in order for them to afford their first home.
In our drive for economic growth, our government must not forget those who are left behind, singles included.
The government also needs to balance between taking care of the rich and the poor.
I wish Minister Khaw success ahead in his new position.
I have full confidence he will be able to tackle our housing issues and take Singapore’s property market to new heights.
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Reader Comments (3 comments)
If you compared apple to apple ( ex-MND & new-MND.), both have different ways of tackling housing needs/requirement, despite the younger generation higher aspiration for BTO/DBSS/flats, it's never easy to make everyone happy, being said, the approach by new MND going for bloke, IT savvy way of communicating with the member of the public, and he did garner admiration and bouquets of roses from all walks of life. Given times, Mr. Khaw will continue to set the pace for more juicy news for us, be it acquiring new flats for 1st timers, tackling upgrading works or finding homes for the old and aged, we look forward to work hand in hand with him. HIs past credentials definitely put him in good stance as an outstanding minister to serve the public well & many more years to come. Cheers!
We should all go back to fundamentals. What is the purpose of HDB? 1) To provide affordable housing to owners, NOT for 2) rental to generate income NOT 3) to buy and sell to make profit. People who want to exercise (2) and (3) should be in the private property sector, where competition is freer. Even on both fronts, the authorities should discriminate against Singaporeans and non-Singaporeans (PRs and foreigners). Higher taxes and restrictions on non-Singaporeans. This can be channelled to help Singaporeans who belong to certain class.
Indeed, the new Minister should be given a chance to tackle the housing problem. Another group that he should also help is those who can't get bank loan should be given a second chance for HDB loan but without asking them to return 50% of the cash proceed as most of it are gone to settle bad debt.