In 2009, I spoke in parliament to ask the government to incentivise parents to leave their homes in mature estates and buy another flat in non-mature estates where their children live. I am happy that Minister Khaw Boon Wan spoke about possible incentives for parents who move out to join their children. news.asiaone/news/singapore/possible-incentives-parents-who-move-out-join-children-non-mature-estates-khaw Extract of speech: I would like to talk about the CPF housing grant. HDB provides an additional $10k to encourage family members to stay nearby. It applies to both parents and married children buying a flat in the same town or within 2 km. The restriction is that the applicant must not have enjoyed HDBs subsidy before. As most elderly parents would have had the subsidy when they applied for new HDB flats in their younger days, they are not eligible. So I believe this grant is mostly given to the children. That creates a situation. Many of the elderly parents live in mature estates like Queenstown. As there are limited new flats built in such areas, the children have to buy resale flats. The CPF housing grant comes in very useful as the prices are usually higher than resale prices in the less mature areas. So if children and parents were to stay near one another, they either pay the market rate or the children have to apply for a new HDB flat near their parents or take advantage of the HDB grant for themselves. The problem is that many of the elderly live in mature estates, such as Queenstown. New flats in these areas are very few and applicants have to ballot. The children, unless they are very lucky, have to turn to buying resale flats. However, resale flats in these areas have a higher premium. It is the governments policy to spread out our residential population to give everyone more space and reduce congestion. Building modern infrastructure, well-equipped town centres and self-sufficient estates like those we see in Sengkang and Punggol are steps in the right direction. I suggest we do more. If we can provide the elderly with attractive incentives to move nearer their children in the newly developing outlying areas, we can reduce congestion greatly on our roads, strengthen family ties and simultaneously, solve some inherent problems of caring for the young and the elderly through proximity. The scenario goes like this. Young couple gets married and gets new flat. Parents get special grant from HDB to purchase a regular flat or granny flat near their children. The whole family can work, study, live and play there. I urge our town planners to have a good mix of studio, 2-,3- & 4-roomers in each estate for this reason. Many estates dont even have 2-roomers near 4 -roomers. So if an elderly couple wants to purchase a studio or 2-room flat within walking distance of their childrens 4-room flat (couples with growing kids need more space), it is impossible. The elderly may not be able to afford the 4-room flat or finds it financially unwise. Hope the Ministry will consider this suggestion seriously.
Posted on: Fri, 18 Jul 2014 04:22:13 +0000
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