Elderly in S’pore not keen on using HDB flats to make money

Singapore — Elderly Singaporeans have shown little interest in using their Housing and Development Board (HDB) flats to get extra cash, as a recent Ministry of National Development (MND) study found that only one in 10 flat owners rented out their units or rooms.

The top reasons cited by those who did not rent out their flats or rooms were their desire for privacy, that they did not have spare rooms nor need the rental income, and concerns over security. The study surveyed 1,243 elderly flat owners last year.

There are 254,000 elderly households here, and 93 per cent are eligible to rent out their whole flat while 39 per cent live on their own and have at least one bedroom to spare, according to the ministry.

Besides the low interest in renting out their units, two schemes for elderly Singaporeans to monetise their flats have also met with low take-up rates.

As of April 30, the HDB has received 265 applications for the enhanced Lease Buyback Scheme, which allows the elderly to sell part of their flat’s lease back to the HDB and use the proceeds for their retirement. Before it was enhanced in February, 474 households had signed up for the original scheme.

Twenty-three applications have been made for the Silver Housing Bonus scheme, which allows eligible elderly to receive a cash bonus of up to S$20,000 per household if they choose to move into a smaller flat and top up their CPF Retirement Account. This scheme was implemented on Feb 1.

A MND spokesperson said the schemes have just been implemented, and the process of qualification and choosing the right size of flats for these programmes would take time.

At the latest Our Singapore Conversation on Housing on Wednesday, industry experts called for the schemes to be simplified to better meet the needs of seniors and for the authorities to play a greater role.

The experts — who are from the property industry, academia and the not-for-profit sector — suggested cutting down on paperwork or doing away with it altogether, and for these schemes to be better publicised.

“We have to remember who these schemes are designed for,” said Professor Joseph Cherian from the National University of Singapore Business School. “It’s for the elderly and people probably in the middle and lower income group, so when you provide schemes to such people, it should be simple to understand, trustworthy and something they are willing to take on because they trust the counter party who is providing the schemes to them.”

According to Ms Fiona Hon, a senior care manager at Hua Mei Centre for Successful Ageing, many elderly did not choose to take up the schemes for fear of losing the benefits they currently received, such as free medicine, housekeeping and laundry.

Other suggestions raised at the session included increasing the quantum of the Silver Housing Bonus and for the HDB to take a greater role in the matching of tenants to units or rooms put up for rent by the elderly.