First Dibs: Who Really Gets the Best Units at a New Launch

For most people, buying a new-launch condo is the largest cheque they will ever write. So they prepare for it like an exam.

They follow the project for months before it opens. They pore over the floor plans, shortlist a few favourite stacks, work the budget down to the last dollar, get a loan in-principle approval ready. On the morning of the public booking day they show up early at the sales gallery — the scale model of the development under glass, the show units styled to perfection, the hum of a full room.

It's an exciting, hopeful morning. You've done your homework, and today, at last, you get to choose.

Then you look at the sales board — the big display that maps every unit, green for available, red for sold — and a lot of it is already red.

That's because, at many launches, the public booking day is not the beginning. As The Straits Times reported, selected buyers — including property agents themselves — are often given first pick in earlier ‘VIP preview’ phases and priority queues, before the doors open to the general public. On the official booking day, the board simply shows which units were taken in those earlier rounds, and which are still going.

The scale isn't trivial. Per the reporting — drawing on earlier figures from The Business Times — property agents bought 635 units through priority queues between September 2024 and October 2025, about 4.2% of all new private homes launched in that period, and as much as around 20% of the units at some individual projects. None of it is against the rules. But if you're the buyer staring at a half-red board, it doesn't feel like a level start.

The reason this is in the news now is that the regulator has taken notice. As The Straits Times reported, the Council for Estate Agencies (CEA) — the body that licenses and oversees property agents — has been in discussions with agencies about sales practices at new launches, ‘arising from public feedback.’

The concern is about fairness, not an allegation of anything unlawful. The discussions, per the reporting, centre on ‘ensuring that regular buyers are not disadvantaged’ and that agents who buy units for themselves ‘strictly adhere to disclosure protocols’ — so a buyer knows when the person advising them is also a competitor for the same unit.

PropKaki doesn't have a side in this, and we're not naming or shaming anyone: the practice is legal, and the vast majority of agents follow the rules. What we can add is the piece the headlines leave out — the market backdrop that makes these launches so sought-after in the first place. So we pulled our own read of the URA data.

The reason a launch can sell a big share of its units before the public day comes down to one thing: demand. On PropKaki's read of the official URA figures, private home prices are still climbing.

Prices are up 2.9% on a year ago, though the last quarter's +0.5% is a gentler pace. Either way, this is a market that has risen for years — the private index has climbed from about 213.2 in 2025Q2 to 219.4 in 2026Q2. When demand is this durable, a well-located launch at a sensible price can draw far more interested buyers than it has units. That imbalance — more buyers than units — is exactly the condition in which early-access advantages like VIP previews start to matter, and to get scrutinised.

Demand isn't spread evenly, and that matters for launches. Here's the year-on-year picture by segment, on our read of the URA data:

The mass-market Outside Central Region rose 3.9% over the year — comfortably the strongest of the three condo regions — while the city fringe (+0.6%) and the priciest core-central homes (+0.5%) were close to flat. Landed housing, a separate segment, led everything at +7.0%.

That OCR strength is the crux, because the mass-market is where most new launches actually happen — the large suburban projects near an MRT, priced for upgraders. The hottest launches tend to sit in the region with the hottest demand, which is precisely where a preview phase can clear the most units before the public ever books.

A new launch usually sells in phases, not all at once. Here's the shape of it, as described in the reporting:

• Earlier phases first. Before the public booking day, a developer may hold VIP preview rounds and open priority queues to selected buyers — which, per The Straits Times, can include property agents buying for themselves.
• The public day. When general booking opens, the sales gallery's board shows which units were sold in those earlier phases and which remain. What looks like the start is, in effect, the middle.
• It's legal. Phased launches and preview sales are a normal, permitted part of how homes are marketed here. The scrutiny is about fairness and disclosure — whether ordinary buyers get enough information and a genuine chance — not about anything unlawful.

Understanding that structure is the first protection. If you walk in assuming the public day is level ground, a half-sold board is a shock. If you know units move in earlier rounds, you can plan around it.

You can't control the phasing, but you can control how prepared you are. A neutral checklist:

• Get the full picture before booking day. Ask your agent — or the developer's sales team — for the complete price list and the current availability, including which stacks and floors already sold in earlier phases. You're entitled to know what's actually left.
• Ask what earlier phases transacted at. Preview prices and public-day prices can differ. Knowing the earlier numbers tells you whether later phases have been repriced, and by how much.
• Check the price against the market, not the room. Compare the per-square-foot price to recent transactions at the project and at nearby launches and resale condos (URA's transacted-price records are public). A busy gallery is designed to feel urgent; the comparables don't care how you feel.
• Have your financing locked. An in-principle loan approval and your cash and CPF sums worked out in advance mean you're deciding on the unit, not scrambling on the maths.
• Ask about disclosure. If your agent is also buying in the same project, that's exactly the conflict the CEA is focused on — a fair agent will tell you.
• Be willing to walk. There will be another launch, and the market backdrop above isn't going anywhere fast. A unit you overpay for in a rush is still overpaid a year later.

None of this is financial advice — it's just how to arrive on equal footing.

It's tempting to assume the VIP round is where the bargains are. Sometimes there's truth in it — a developer may price an early preview phase a touch keener to build momentum. But it cuts the other way too: in a launch that's selling well, later phases are frequently repriced upward, so the early buyers paid less partly because the project hadn't yet proven its demand.

The honest answer is that queue position is not the same as value. With the private market up just 2.9% over the year and 0.5% on the quarter, this isn't a runaway market where every day of delay costs you dearly. What protects your money isn't getting in first — it's paying a price the comparables support, through a process where you could actually see what was available. That's the whole point of the fairness question the CEA is weighing: not that early buyers should ‘win,’ but that everyone should get to make an informed choice.

PropKaki reads one official record directly here: URA's private residential Property Price Index (2009Q1 = 100), including its breakdown by market segment (CCR / RCR / OCR) and for landed homes, for 2026Q2.

Two caveats we carry rather than bury. The PPI is an index — it tracks relative movement across the whole private market, not dollar prices, and the most recent quarter can be a provisional flash estimate URA later revises. And the launch specifics — the VIP preview practice, the 635 units and 4.2% share, the around-20%-at-some-launches figure, and the CEA discussions — are from The Straits Times' reporting (itself drawing on earlier Business Times figures), not PropKaki data; we've attributed each where it appears.

• PropKaki analysis of URA private residential Property Price Index (2026Q2), overall and by market segment.
• The Straits Times — VIP sales at condo launches under scrutiny after agents get first dibs (original reporting by Joyce Lim, syndicated via Yahoo News Singapore), which draws on earlier reporting by The Business Times.

This is editorial analysis by the PropKaki Editorial Desk, written for general information only — it is opinion and context, not a valuation, financial advice or a recommendation. PropKaki is neutral: we don't name or shame agents, agencies or projects. The launch practices and regulatory details are drawn from published reporting; the market figures are PropKaki's read of URA statistics. Always verify prices, unit availability and launch details against official sources (the developer's appointed marketing agent, URA transacted-price records, and CEA) before acting.