How much does your HDB lose in value each year?
A Singapore HDB flat does not lose a fixed amount every year. For most owners, the loss is small, between 0.2% and 0.4%. The rate then accelerates sharply once the remaining lease drops past 60 years. We mapped the curve.
The Short Answer
The numbers above are based on Singapore Land Authority's Bala's Table, the official leasehold relativity model used by professional valuers and SLA itself. They describe the structural loss from lease decay alone, before any market growth.
The Decay Curve, Year by Year
A fresh 99-year lease is the baseline. As remaining lease drops, value drops with it, but not on a straight line. The curve is gentle at the top and gets steeper as the lease runs down.
Both lines share the same x-axis. The cumulative curve (navy, left axis) shows how much of the original value remains. The loss-rate line (red, right axis) is the year-on-year drop. Notice that the cumulative slope and the loss rate accelerate together past the 60-year mark.
Show reference values
Why the Drop Speeds Up After 60 Years Left
Bala's Table is a smooth curve, but real-world prices drop faster than Bala past the 60-year mark. The reason is financing.
Bank loan tenure
Banks cap the loan tenure at the lower of (25 years) or (65 minus the buyer's age) or (remaining lease minus a buffer). Once the lease is short, the loan window closes and buyers must put down more cash. Fewer eligible buyers means lower prices.
CPF usage rule
CPF can only be used in full if the remaining lease covers the youngest buyer to age 95. When that condition fails, CPF usage is pro-rated, which forces buyers to bring more cash. This shrinks the realistic buyer pool, especially for younger buyers.
Loan-to-value ratio
Maximum LTV from banks falls to 55% (from 75%) for flats with shorter remaining leases. The buyer must come up with the difference in cash, on top of stamp duty and renovation costs.
Where Most Singapore HDBs Sit on the Curve
Of 9,699 HDB blocks tracked, the median has 66 years of lease remaining, putting most owners in the slow-decay band. Only 31.8% of blocks are past the 60-year mark where the curve steepens.
What This Means If You Own or Buy
If you own a flat with 70+ years left
Lease decay is small, around 0.2–0.3% per year, and is usually offset by general market growth. Selling pressure from lease alone is minimal. Watch town and flat-type trends instead.
If you own a flat with 50–69 years left
You are in the band where the curve starts to steepen. Annual loss creeps up to 0.4–0.6%. Still not catastrophic, but if you plan to sell in the next 10 years, the gap between Bala's slow loss and the financing-rule cliff at 60 years matters.
If you own a flat with under 50 years left
The structural loss is now meaningful, around 0.7–1.0% per year, and accelerating. Buyers will face CPF and loan limits. Pricing for sale should account for a smaller realistic buyer pool, not just the headline transaction price of similar flats.
If you are a buyer
Compare the price discount on a shorter-lease flat against the financing constraints you will inherit. A 30% lower price is not a bargain if your bank and CPF rules limit how you can pay for it, or how the next buyer can pay for it from you.
About This Analysis
Methodology
All percentages on the decay curve come from Bala's Table, the leasehold relativity model published by the Singapore Land Authority. The formula is balaRatio(T) = 1 − (1/1.035)^T where T is the remaining lease in years. We anchor at T=99 as the "fresh lease" reference. Annual loss at any point is approximated as the local slope of the curve. Real market prices may differ from Bala in either direction because of location effects, flat-type composition, and overall market growth, but Bala remains the structural benchmark used by professional valuers and SLA. Lease-remaining values for each block come from HDB transaction records, sourced from data.gov.sg and refreshed monthly. For the full valuation methodology, see our methodology page.
Frequently Asked Questions
How much value does an HDB flat lose each year?
An HDB flat does not lose a fixed percentage every year. The rate depends on how much lease is left. Roughly: 0.19% per year at 80–89 years remaining, 0.38% at 60–69, 0.76% at 40–49. The decay accelerates as the lease shortens. The median Singapore HDB has 66 years left and theoretically loses about 0.37% of its value per year at this point on the curve.
Why does HDB value drop faster after 60 years remaining?
From 60 years remaining onwards, two financing rules start to bite. Maximum bank loan tenure shrinks, and CPF usage gets pro-rated when the lease cannot cover the youngest buyer to age 95. Both rules force buyers to bring more cash, which shrinks the buyer pool, which compresses resale prices.
How much will my HDB be worth in 20 or 30 years?
Take your current remaining lease, subtract the years you want to project forward, and apply Bala's Table. A flat with 80 years remaining today will, on a Bala basis alone, be worth about 93.3% of today's value when 60 years remain (after 20 years), and about 87.7% when 50 years remain (after 30 years). This is before any market growth.
Does the value really drop, or is it just market noise?
Both are real. Bala's Table captures the structural loss from a shorter remaining lease. On top of that, market growth (or correction), location-level appreciation, and flat-type effects move prices around. The net effect on your specific flat is the sum of all of these, not Bala alone.
What is Bala's Table?
Bala's Table is the leasehold relativity model published by the Singapore Land Authority in 1948 and still used today as the official benchmark. It gives the value of a leasehold property at any remaining lease length, relative to a freshly issued 99-year lease. Professional valuers, banks, and SLA all reference it.
See your block's lease decay projection
Search any HDB block to view its current value, remaining lease, and value projection at every future year.