Good Class Bungalows on Demand and Only Locals Can Buy It
The price of the Good Class Bungalows or the GCB’s is on a record high even as the demand for other property in Singapore is on a downward trend. The main reason attributed to this high demand and rise in prices is the exclusivity it is offering, these homes can be bought only by locals or people with citizenship and not foreign buyers who are mostly from China. Moreover, there is also a scarcity of these bungalows with only about 2,500 available in the city both these factors have increased the price of these bungalows. These houses range from the modern homes designed by renowned architects with landscaped gardens to infinity pools to the homes of the colonial era.
Despite the property curbs placed by the state-city administration in the year 2018 and even after a decline of 0.1% in house values in the past three months after being on a high for nearly 5 three quarters, the GCB’s are still rallying high. CBRE Group Inc director of capital markets Sammu Lim said ‘Due to scarcity and exclusivity, the GCB market has always been regarded as the jewel of the residential market.
As per the Global Wealth report of 2018 published by Credit Suisse Research, Singapore stands 9th in having the most millionaires in the country and is considered as one of the wealthiest nations in the world. That has helped the GCM properties to a great extent as the number of transactions nearly doubled in the later part of 2018 when compared to the first half of the same year as per CBRE. Buyers of these properties as per KH Tan, MD of Newsman Realty which deals with GCB bungalows are mostly wealthy locals or outsiders who have got citizenship. He said ‘The super rich want to buy the best diamond, the best car so in Singapore residential, the Good Class Bungalow is the best you can get.’
What are the restrictions on GCB homes?
Apart from the citizenship criteria, there are other requirements for the GCB’s; namely, the land should be at least 1/3rd of an acre, the house should not be more than 25% of the plot, or it cannot be more than two floors. In a state where about 7.9k people live in a 1km area of land, these specifications are truly a luxury which the super-rich will be happy to pay, and they can very well afford to.
