Singaporean woman’s 13 failed BTO attempts spark debate on housing ballot fairness

“Honestly, BTO remains the best option and if we were ever given the opportunity, we would definitely go for a unit. But I guess we gotta settle and appreciate what we have,” Chua concluded.

Muted demand and growing balance flat supply

Chua’s video emerged against the backdrop of shifting dynamics in Singapore’s public housing market.

According to The Straits Times, demand for certain Plus and Prime flats has softened notably since the new classification system was introduced in October 2024.

In the February 2026 BTO sales exercise, all first-time buyers of three- and four-room flats in Kim Keat Crest, a Plus project in Toa Payoh, were effectively assured the opportunity to select a unit — a situation that would once have been unusual in a mature estate.

The same exercise offered some 4,320 balance flats for sale, exceeding HDB’s initially committed supply of 3,000 units. The Straits Times reported that 22 Prime or Plus BTO projects were among those offering balance flats, with at least 13 projects recording undersubscription in at least one flat type.

In a written parliamentary reply on 25 February 2026, National Development Minister Chee Hong Tat said HDB currently holds close to 900 unselected flats from previous Sale of Balance Flats (SBF) exercises.

Property analysts attributed the softening demand in part to the stricter resale conditions attached to Plus and Prime flats, which include a 10-year minimum occupation period (MOP) and a subsidy clawback mechanism. These conditions were designed to reduce speculative purchasing in desirable locations and limit what analysts have described as a “lottery effect” — whereby owners of flats in sought-after areas could realise substantial profits upon reaching the usual five-year MOP.

Despite this broader context of softer demand, applicants at specific projects in areas such as Bukit Merah and Kallang/Whampoa — the very projects Chua had applied for — continued to face queues exceeding available supply for certain flat types.

Widespread public response

The video prompted a voluminous and largely sympathetic public response.

One commenter said she and her husband had twice received appointment dates to select a flat in Yishun, only to be informed the day before each appointment that the relevant quota had been reached. She expressed frustration that the same units subsequently appeared in the following SBF exercise, rather than being offered to the next applicants in the queue.

Another commenter said she had applied 25 times across multiple towns over ten years before finally securing a two-room flexi unit in Woodlands. Another commenter said he had applied 18 times before succeeding. Several others reported reaching double digits before obtaining a flat.

A commenter described a successful strategy that involved persistent follow-up with HDB officers and assistance from MPs in two separate Group Representation Constituencies (GRCs), one governed by the People’s Action Party (PAP) and the other by the Workers’ Party (WP). She said the process, while exhausting, resulted in securing a flat within a year.

Others drew a distinction between applicants who had balloted exclusively for popular central locations and those who had spread their applications more broadly.

Some suggested that choosing less-subscribed projects in towns such as Tengah, Woodlands or Sengkang significantly improved the chances of success. A male commenter noted that he succeeded on his first attempt by selecting Tengah.

Several commenters raised the role of ethnic quotas in explaining the gap between published balance unit figures and individual applicants’ experiences. One observed that units apparently available as leftover inventory might have been reserved for applicants of specific ethnic groups, consistent with HDB’s Ethnic Integration Policy (EIP).

A number of commenters called for independent auditing of the ballot system, with one describing it as excessively opaque and another calling for HDB to deploy technology to reallocate surrendered units more efficiently.

Some questioned whether the income ceiling or proximity to family considerations had contributed to Chua’s difficulty in obtaining a flat, citing the various priority schemes available to certain applicants.

Others were more pointed, alleging that newly naturalised citizens had skewed demand in ways that disadvantaged long-term residents, though such claims were not substantiated with evidence.

Some viewers questioned whether 13 attempts over approximately three years was arithmetically possible, given that BTO exercises are held roughly three to four times a year.

With BTO launches alone, three years would yield at most nine to twelve exercises. However, HDB also conducts separate Sale of Balance Flats (SBF) exercises, in which unsold units from earlier launches are offered to applicants.

The HDB had not publicly responded to the specific concerns raised in Chua’s video at the time of publication.

Parliament had already flagged the problem

Chua’s frustrations were not without precedent at the institutional level. Parliamentary records show the issue had been raised formally on at least three occasions between 2023 and 2025, with the government’s position on the core reform she sought made explicit as recently as February 2025.

In January 2023, then-Member of Parliament Cheryl Chan Wei Ling asked the then-Minister for National Development Desmond Lee how many first-timer applicants had tried more than four times between 2017 and 2022 without success, and what proportion had subsequently turned to the resale market.

Lee’s reply revealed that between 2017 and 2021, approximately 2,200 first-timer families had been unsuccessful after more than four BTO attempts. Of these, 99 per cent had applied exclusively in mature estates. Around 14 per cent subsequently purchased a resale flat — a pattern that closely mirrors Chua’s own trajectory.

The data predates the current Standard, Plus and Prime classification system introduced in October 2024, and the landscape has since shifted. However, the figures establish that persistent failure in mature estate applications was a documented, systemic pattern well before the current classification regime.

The government’s response at the time was to encourage applicants to consider non-mature estates, where additional ballot chances are provided to those with two or more prior unsuccessful attempts.

Critically, this additional weighting applies only to Standard flat applications in non-mature estates. Applicants who had focused on mature or prime locations — as Chua had — were not covered by this provision.

In September 2023, Workers’ Party MP Sylvia Lim pressed the matter further, asking whether the Ministry of National Development would consider adjusting the ballot system to accord weightage to the total number of prior unsuccessful attempts across all exercises, including the Sale of Balance Flats (SBF), regardless of location.

Lee’s reply acknowledged the government’s commitment to helping first-time buyers but did not extend the additional ballot weighting to mature estate or SBF applications.

Instead, he announced a new First-Timer (Parents and Married Couples) category, granting three ballot chances from the outset to families with a child aged 18 and below, or married couples aged 40 and below buying their first home. The September 2023 exchange took place at the same time Chua was navigating the later stages of her own application process, meaning the policy debate was active and unresolved while she was still in the queue.

The most direct government response to the kind of reform Chua called for came in February 2025, when former PAP MP Gan Thiam Poh asked whether HDB would consider a system that ranked unsuccessful first-timer applicants by the number of previous attempts and allowed them a second opportunity to choose from flats remaining after the initial selection round.

Lee rejected the proposal. In his reply, he pointed to improvements already made to the ballot system, including a reduction in the shortlisting cap from 300 per cent to 200 per cent of flat supply from the February 2025 BTO and SBF exercises onwards.

The change was intended to reduce the number of applicants assigned queue numbers far beyond the available supply — precisely the situation Chua had described. He also noted that the non-selection rate had fallen from approximately 40 per cent to around 19 per cent following the tightening of non-selection rules in October 2023.

Lee added that first-timer families purchasing a resale flat on the open market were eligible for up to S$230,000 in housing grants following increases in March 2023 and August 2024. He concluded that with the various measures already in place, the government had “no current plans” to allow unsuccessful first-timer applicants another opportunity to choose from remaining flats after the initial selection round.