Woman wins right to ex-husband’s proceeds from Golden Mile Tower unit, fails in claim over in-laws’ HDB flat

SINGAPORE — A group of siblings and the ex-wife of the youngest sibling went to court after the woman made a claim on a flat, which her ex-husband and his siblings argued belongs to their mother. The woman also laid claim to the money her ex-husband got after he sold his share in a unit at Golden Mile Tower.

Ms Ho Kim Yan alleged that the siblings contrived to deprive her of her rightful share in these assets after her marriage with their brother broke down.

She claimed that her former father-in-law had gifted the Housing and Development Board (HDB) flat in Bedok North to his son Kua Swee Hor, who is Ms Ho’s ex-husband. The son then gifted the flat to her, she said.

When they divorced in 2021, as part of the divorce proceedings, Ms Ho filed a proposed matrimonial property plan, claiming half the share of the flat and proposed that her ex-husband buy over her share of the flat. 

The other disputed asset is a second-floor unit in commercial building Golden Mile Tower along Beach Road, which was bought by Mr Kua and his friend as an investment in November 2013.

He had sold his half share to his friend for S$237,822.74 in August 2022 and earned money from the sale. The money is now held by Mr Kua’s solicitors.  

Mr Kua claimed that at the beginning, his mother had used S$100,000 and largely funded the purchase of his share in this unit for her own investment, and therefore the proceeds should not be part of his matrimonial assets.

His mother, Madam Ng Bee Ngoah, has dementia now. 

Ms Ho disputed this, arguing that the unit belongs to her ex-husband completely and is a matrimonial asset, of which she has a right. 

On Tuesday (April 25), High Court judge Hri Kumar Nair ruled that the proceeds from the sale of half the share of the Golden Mile Tower unit belonged to Mr Kua and should be dealt with as part of his matrimonial assets.

As for the HDB flat, the judge dismissed Ms Ho’s counterclaim for the order that her ex-husband buy over her half share of the flat. 

He ruled that the flat belongs to the estate of the late father and it is up to the estate to handle this.

Court documents showed that the flat was bought in 1978 by Mr Kua Oh Kim, Mr Kua Swee Hor’s late father, after he and his wife moved from China to Singapore.

The couple had five children in the following order, from the oldest to the youngest: Ms Kua Swee Hoon, Mr Kua Swee Lin, Mr Kua Swee Leong, Ms Kua Swee Hong, and Mr Kua Swee Hor. 

Mr Kua Swee Hor married Ms Ho in 1996 and they have three children.

In 2004, his father included Mr Kua Swee Hor’s name as a joint tenant of the flat.

A year after his father died in 2012, Mr Kua Swee Hor named Ms Ho as a joint tenant.

In May 2021, Ms Ho initiated divorce proceedings and it was only after she made the claim related to the flat in the matrimonial proceedings that her ex-husband's siblings discovered that their brother had put Ms Ho’s name as a joint tenant. 

The siblings, excluding Mr Kua Swee Leong, argued that the flat should belong to their mother, along with half the share of Mr Kua Swee Hor’s proceeds from the Golden Mile Tower unit.

Since Mdm Ng has dementia, Mr Kua Swee Lin, who is the oldest son in the family, applied under the Mental Capacity Act to be able to make decisions on behalf of his mother.

He obtained a court order appointing him as Mdm Ng’s deputy in October last year and on behalf of his mother, took Ms Ho and Mr Kua Swee Hor to court.

FATHER DID NOT INTEND TO ‘GIFT’ FLAT TO SON

In his judgement on Tuesday, Justice Hri Kumar said the evidence suggested that the late father of the family did not intend to gift the flat to Mr Kua Swee Hor. 

Rather, his main concern was to include a joint tenant to the flat to ease administrative matters upon his death to spare his wife any trouble. 

At that point in time, Mr Kua Swee Hor was the only one who was eligible to be added as a joint tenant. Court documents did not state the reason for his eligibility. 

Mr Kua Swee Lin, acting on behalf of their mother, took the position that though the flat was under his brother and Ms Ho’s names, they were only taking care of it for his mother and the siblings.

Ms Ho’s stance was that she held the flat for the benefit of her former mother-in-law. 

Both their arguments were rejected by Justice Hri Kumar on the basis that there was no evidence to prove that the late father intended Mr Kua Swee Hor to hold the flat on behalf of the siblings, or for Ms Ho to hold it on trust for Mdm Ng. 

He found, based on all the evidence, that Mr Kua Swee Hor had no intention of giving Ms Ho a half share of the flat when he included her name in the HDB lease document. 

One reason was that after his father's death, Mr Kua Swee Hor was required under HDB rules to include a family member as a co-owner of the flat to form a family nucleus.

Secondly, Ms Ho and her ex-husband have their own matrimonial home and do not live in, or need, the flat, court documents stated.

NO EVIDENCE THAT MOTHER FUNDED PURCHASE OF UNIT

Justice Hri Kumar also found that there was no evidence that Mdm Ng’s money had been used to partly fund the purchase of the Golden Mile Tower unit. 

Mr Kua Swee Lin and Mr Kua Swee Hor’s argument was that their parents had a traditional mentality and habit of keeping large amounts of cash, as they often had to pay suppliers of their business.

The judge said that the parents had retired almost 25 years ago, and he thus did not accept that Mdm Ng had kept large amounts of cash in the flat amounting to at least S$50,000 in order to fund the unit’s purchase.

In addition, it is unlikely that her children would allow Mdm Ng to keep large amounts of cash at home, due to her incapability of handling legal matters and poor health as a result of dementia.

He said that the children would therefore “likely have wanted to take steps to safeguard Mdm Ng’s money”, such as when her oldest daughter had helped her open fixed deposit accounts to keep her money. 

This means that Mdm Ng does not have a share in the sale proceeds of the Golden Mile Tower unit. 

Justice Hri Kumar also rejected the evidence of the passbook to Mdm Ng and Mr Kua Swee Hor’s joint bank account, which was submitted by Mr Kua Swee Lin, to show that she had withdrawn S$58,457 to pay for the share of the Golden Mile Tower unit. 

This was because the date of withdrawal was almost two months after the purchase of the unit. 

This discrepancy was not addressed until the judge pointed it out at a court hearing, after which Mr Kua Swee Lin tried to apply for leave to file an affidavit to explain it.

However, the judge denied his application, saying that it was Mr Kua Swee Lin and Mr Kua Swee Hor’s responsibility to put all the relevant evidence to the court before the hearing.

Justice Hri Kumar also noted that although Mr Kua Swee Hor said that a part of the unit was his mother’s investment, he had declared it as his property and paid taxes on the rental proceeds he received.

He had also collected the rent proceeds entirely for himself, which was inconsistent with his claim that the unit was his mother’s investment.