As a parent whose property has cleared the Minimum Occupation Period (MOP), you may buy a property for your child (who must be below 21 years of age) under the creation of 'trust'. As it's your child's first property, only the ABSD (Trust) is charged to the trustee at 35% of the property price. This ABSD (Trust) is eligible for remission as long as the beneficiary is identified within 6 months without conditions to disqualify them. This property must be paid for in full cash. The property will be legally owned by your child once he/she has turned 21 years old.
If you currently have a bank loan, you may consider 'refinancing' by transferring your remaining mortgage loan from your current mortgagor to a bank with lower interest (%) rates. This effectively reduces your monthly mortgage payment amount for the remainder of your loan tenure, so that you can benefit from having more cash on-hand over the years.
Homeowners over the age of 50 may stretch their loan tenure up to the age of 75, instead of the original limit age of 65. You may do this by refinancing and stretching your loan tenure upon Temporary Occupation Permit (TOP) date, or as an existing homeowner. However, a stretched tenure is limited to a 55% Loan-to-Value (LTV) limit and requires a 10% down payment. The maximum loan period of 30 years still apply.
Typically done to 'free up' one of the joint tenants in a unit (i.e. married couple). One party buys over the shares of a co-owned unit and incurs the necessary Buyer's Stamp Duty (BSD) charges and legal admin fees. The BSD amount will be prorated according to the percentage (%) of share owned by the parting individual based on the current market valuation. The freed party may now purchase a separate property without incurring any Additional Buyer's Stamp Duty (ABSD) fees.
This is an alternate form of refinancing performed when the combined cost of BSD fees and legal admin fees from decoupling the current property shares is greater than the cost of incurring ABSD on the next intended property purchase. The 2 original owners are kept as such, but 1 borrower is removed. This freed borrower will incur ABSD charges on their next property purchase, but is able to enjoy a LTV limit of 75% as a 'first-time borrower'.
A long-term property investment strategy involving the intentional share split of 99% and 1% between co-owners. Only first-time private property owner couples are eligible. This may be done upon purchase of a co-owned property to significantly reduce the final BSD charges incurred upon a possible future decoupling.
Only applicable for private properties, a MEWL is the withdrawal of value (cash) from a partially- or fully-paid off property you currently own. For partially-paid off loans, the maximum amount withdrawable is calculated as [75% of current property valuation] - [Outstanding Loan] - [CPF Accrued Interest]; this amount is subject to Total Debt Servicing Ratio (TDSR). Fully paid properties will not be subjected to TDSR if the LTV withdrawn is 50% and below. Conditionally, 24-months of monthly installments of this amount must be put into a Fixed Deposit as collateral.
Pledging
A loan amount can be secured once 48-months worth of the monthly shortfall amount is put into a Fixed Deposit (FD) as collateral, in the case of defaulting on payments.
Unpledging
If you're able to show 3.33x of the 48-month pledge amount in funds/liquid assets (1) upon loan application; and once more (2) before loan disbursement, you do not need to leave any amount into a FD to secure that loan amount. 3.33x is used since 'unpledging' only recognises the pledge amount to be 30% viable.
