Written answer by Ministry of National Development on applications from single unwed parents to purchase or rent HDB flats

Mar 4, 2024

Question No: 5594

Question by: Mr Louis Ng Kok Kwang

To ask the Minister for National Development:

a) for each year in the past two years, how many single unwed parents have applied to (i) purchase or (ii) rent a HDB flat from HDB, respectively;

b) how many of such applications have been rejected respectively; and

c) what are the reasons for the rejections.

Answer:

HDB assesses all requests from single unwed parents holistically, based on their individual circumstances. Those who are aged 21 and above and can afford to buy a flat, will be allowed to buy up to a 3-room flat in a non-mature estate from HDB, or a resale flat. Those who cannot afford to buy a flat may be offered public rental housing, if it is assessed to be in their child’s best interests, taking into account input from social workers as necessary.

Purchase of Flats

2. Over the past two years, HDB supported an average of 72% of requests from single unwed parents each year to purchase a flat from HDB. See Table 1 for details.

Table 1: Requests from Single Unwed Parents to Purchase a Flat from HDB

Year	Number of Unique Requests	Number of Successful Requests
2022	138	102
2023	166¹	118

3. For the remaining requests, these included applicants who did not follow through with their applications, or did not have sufficient budget at that point in time to buy a flat.

Public Rental Flats

4. Over the past two years, HDB assisted an average of 46% of requests from single unwed parents each year to rent a public rental flat. See Table 2 for details.

Table 2: Requests from Single Unwed Parents to Rent a Public Rental Flat

Year	Number of Unique Requests² (including general enquiries and incomplete requests)	Number of Successful Requests
2022	275	130
2023	345	156

5. For the remaining requests, these included applicants who did not follow through with their applications, had the means to purchase a flat, or had family members who could house them.

¹ 14 requests received in late 2023 are currently being processed.
² Single unwed parents who made multiple requests in different years have been reflected in the figures based on the date of their latest request.