Thomas Ong Downsized to a $140,000 Two-Room Flat. What a Five-Room Frees Up, Town by Town

Thomas Ong's new home is about as small as an HDB flat gets. It is a two-room Flexi of 409 sq ft, or 38 sq m, close to Canberra MRT station and the shopping malls nearby. According to Mothership, he bought it for $140,000 and spent under $80,000 on the renovation.

He got it through HDB's Sale of Balance Flats (SBF), the exercise in which HDB sells flats left over from earlier launches. He told his followers he was surprised to be successful, because only two units were left.

The interiors are deliberately dark: he told Lianhe Zaobao he wanted a calm space to rest in. He has lived there about two months. "This is the last time I'll ever move in my life," he told the paper.

The headline says Mr Ong went from a five-room flat to a two-room one. The report itself describes a longer path. He previously lived in a five-room flat in Toa Payoh, then in a three-room flat in Kim Keat, and only then in the flat near Canberra.

Mothership does not say when each move happened, what he sold each flat for, or which lease he chose for the new one, so we won't guess. What it does give is his reasoning: less housework, fewer things, and no spare rooms filling up with clutter. Health, he said, was behind his decision to stop acting.

That is the lifestyle half of the story. The other half is money. A five-room flat and a two-room flat are now very different assets, and the gap between them is often the largest single sum a retiring HDB household can unlock. How large depends heavily on where you sell and where you buy.

Here is the national picture from our analysis of HDB resale records, October 2025 to September 2026:

All towns. Medians across every block, floor and lease.

Step down from the median five-room to the median two-room and the gross gap is $368,000. Notice the lease column. The two-room flats that resell are, on the whole, young: 53% of them had leases that began in 2018 or later, most of them from the two-room Flexi era. The five-rooms are older, with a median 73 years left.

That gap has grown in dollars. On calendar-year national medians, it was $238,000 in 2017 and $368,000 in 2025. But look at why. The five-room median rose 54% over those eight years and the two-room median 53%. In proportion, nothing changed: a two-room still costs about half a five-room. Downsizing releases more dollars today simply because every flat costs more.

Most people who downsize stay near the life they already have, so the national figure is only a start. This is the same comparison within each town, over the same twelve months:

Towns with at least 10 five-room and 10 two-room resales, sorted by gap. Medians rounded to the nearest $1,000; gross, before CPF refunds, loans and fees. Five-room medians include DBSS flats where a town has them.

The middle of the table is the useful part. In 12 of the 20 towns, selling a typical five-room and buying a typical two-room on the resale market frees up somewhere between about $275,000 and $430,000 before costs. The median across the 20 towns was $383,500.

Six towns had steady five-room sales but too few two-room resales to compare: Bishan (0), Bukit Timah (0), Central Area (6), Clementi (5), Marine Parade (1), Serangoon (0). In Bishan, Bukit Timah and Serangoon there were none at all. Right-sizing to a two-room there means moving out of town, or settling on a different flat.

The top of the table looks like the best deal, and it needs a warning.

In Toa Payoh, the median five-room resold for $1,050,000 and the median two-room for $280,000, a gap of $770,000. But the two-room flats changing hands there are old. Their median remaining lease was 41 years. Six of the seven widest gaps are in towns where the two-rooms on offer had a median lease of under 70 years: Bukit Merah, Toa Payoh, Ang Mo Kio, Kallang/Whampoa, Geylang, Bedok.

So the extra cash comes partly from buying a flat with a short lease. For someone in their late fifties, about 40 years may be enough, but it is a different purchase from a Flexi flat with 90 years to run.

The five-room side carries its own twist. Toa Payoh's median includes 27 DBSS flats, which sell well above the town's other five-rooms. Leave them out and its five-room median was $980,000.

Queenstown is different. Its two-rooms are new, with a median 88 years of lease left, and they cost $515,000. Its gap stays wide for the opposite reason: its five-rooms, at a median $1.23 million, are the dearest in the table.

We don't know what Mr Ong sold his earlier flats for, or when. What we can do is price each step of his route in today's market, using the year to September 2026.

PropKaki analysis of HDB resale records. A median price for each step today, not what Mr Ong paid or received.

The last row is the striking one. Two-room flats of the same 38 sq m on Canberra Street, Crescent and Walk resold for between $360,000 and $390,000 over the year, with a median 94 years of lease left. Mr Ong's reported $140,000 is about $225,000 below that median.

That is roughly what buying a flat like this from HDB, rather than on the resale market, is worth, though a new flat brings its own conditions, and for second-timers an extra charge. HDB's own price lists show the same pattern. In its June 2026 launch, HDB priced a 99-year Type 1 two-room Flexi at $142,000 to $184,000 at Sembawang Portico and $139,000 to $187,000 at Sembawang Brook. In the same document, nearby 47 sq m two-room resales had transacted at $322,000 to $390,000, with about 93 years left (HDB, Annex A).

Mothership did not say which lease Mr Ong chose, and an SBF price is set flat by flat, so his $140,000 is not a guide to any other unit.

For a downsizer, the new-flat route adds a choice that the resale market does not offer: a short lease.

Singapore Citizens whose buyers and spouses are all 55 or older can buy a two-room Flexi from HDB on a lease of 15 to 45 years, in 5-year steps. The lease must last every buyer and spouse to at least age 95 (HDB, seniors). The shorter the lease, the lower the price. At Sembawang Portico in June 2026, a Type 1 flat cost:

Source: HDB, June 2026 BTO, Annex A, Table A(1)(i). Excluding grants.

The trade-off is permanent. A short-lease two-room Flexi cannot be sold on the open market. If you stop living in it, it goes back to HDB, which pays you for the unused part of the lease (HDB).

The other price is time and luck. New flats come through launches and ballots; Mr Ong said only two units were left when he applied. A resale two-room can be bought this month.

These are the rules as HDB and CPF state them on 20 October 2026.

Short-lease two-room Flexi from HDB (HDB, seniors, last updated 16 September 2026):

• Who: a Singapore Citizen; every buyer and spouse at least 55 when applying for the HFE letter.
• Income ceiling: $16,000 a month for HFE letters applied for from 24 August 2026 (HDB).
• Your current flat: you can buy first, then dispose of any HDB flat within six months of completing the purchase. The same six-month rule applies to private homes.
• An extra charge for most second-timers: families pay the lower of their resale levy or $30,000; singles, and anyone who owned or sold a private home in the past 30 months, pay $30,000. Both are pro-rated to the lease and paid in cash.
• CPF: you must first set aside your Basic Retirement Sum before using any extra Ordinary Account savings on it (CPF).

A 99-year two-room Flexi follows the ordinary family and singles rules instead, with an income ceiling of $8,000 a month when bought from HDB (HDB).

The 15-month wait-out is gone, and was never yours. HDB removed it on 28 July 2026. It only ever applied to private property owners buying a resale flat without grants, and seniors moving to a four-room or smaller one were already exempt. An HDB owner selling a five-room was never caught by it. For private owners buying a subsidised flat, the 30-month wait-out still stands (our earlier commentary).

HDB pays a cash bonus for exactly this kind of move, on one condition: some of the released money has to become retirement income.

The Silver Housing Bonus works like this:

• Who: at least one owner a Singapore Citizen aged 55 or above, household income of $16,000 or less, selling an HDB flat that has met its MOP (or a private home with an annual value of up to $31,000) and buying a three-room or smaller flat.
• The commitment: a net increase of up to $60,000 in your CPF Retirement Account, which goes towards CPF LIFE payouts. Your CPF housing refunds from the sale can count, so you may not need a cash top-up.
• The bonus: $1 for every $2 committed, up to $30,000, plus a flat $10,000 if you move to a two-room or smaller flat. The most a household can get is $40,000.
• The timing: book the new flat, or submit the resale application, before you sell or within 12 months of completing the sale; then apply within a year of the second completion.

HDB's own worked example is close to the move in this story. A couple sell a five-room in Yishun for $705,000 and buy a new two-room Flexi on a 30-year lease for $83,000. After a $100,000 outstanding loan and a $15,000 resale levy, their net proceeds are $507,000. They commit $60,000 from their CPF housing refunds and receive the full $40,000 bonus.

Our Silver Housing Bonus guide covers the full eligibility table and the timing traps.

A few limits, stated plainly.

The gap is gross. Before any of it is yours, the sale has to repay any outstanding loan, and the CPF you used on the flat goes back to your CPF account with the interest it would have earned. Agent fees, legal costs, stamp duty on the next flat and any resale levy or extra charge come off too. For many long-time owners, a large share of the gap lands in CPF, not in the bank.

A median is not your flat. Your own block, storey, lease and condition will put you somewhere around it.

Cheap two-rooms are often old two-rooms, and a short lease from HDB is a one-way door: the flat can only ever go back to HDB.

Mr Ong's flat is not in our numbers. SBF flats are bought from HDB, not on the resale market, so they never appear in resale records. Our data runs to September 2026, and the latest months are still filling in.

What we would not hedge on: in most HDB towns, a five-room flat now sells for roughly twice what a two-room does, and that is a lot of room for a retirement plan.

Two kinds of numbers, kept apart.

From the reporting: Mr Ong's age, flat, price, renovation budget, earlier homes and reasons come from Mothership, which cites Lianhe Zaobao and his own social media post. We have kept to what was published.

From HDB and CPF: the short-lease and Silver Housing Bonus rules (HDB pages read on 20 October 2026), the wait-out removal (28 July 2026), income ceilings (August 2026), the CPF Basic Retirement Sum rule, and June 2026 prices and resale comparables (HDB's Annex A).

PropKaki's own data, from HDB resale records:

• The national and town comparisons use resales registered from October 2025 to September 2026. October 2026 is still being registered and is left out. A town appears only if it had at least 10 five-room and 10 two-room resales.
• The Toa Payoh, Kim Keat and Canberra figures use the same window. "Kim Keat" means resales on Kim Keat streets; "Canberra" means two-room flats of 40 sq m or less on Canberra streets in Sembawang.
• The yearly gap uses calendar-year national medians from 2017 to 2025.
• The $225,000 difference is the Canberra median minus the price Mothership reported.

The news:

• Mothership: Thomas Ong, 57, downsizes from 5-room to 2-room HDB flat in Canberra as he retires from acting, 10 October 2026.

Official:

• HDB: Eligibility for seniors: short-lease 2-room Flexi flat and Community Care Apartment, updated 16 September 2026.
• HDB: Short-lease 2-room Flexi flat.
• HDB: Silver Housing Bonus.
• HDB: Removal of the 15-month wait-out period for private residential property owners, 28 July 2026.
• HDB: Increase in income ceilings, August 2026.
• HDB: June 2026 BTO sales exercise, Annex A.
• CPF: Using CPF savings for a short-lease 2-room Flexi flat.

The data:

• PropKaki analysis of HDB resale transactions, October 2025 to September 2026, and calendar years 2017 to 2025.

Related on PropKaki: our July piece on the downsizing windfall and the two-room Flexi guide.

This is commentary by the PropKaki Editorial Desk on reporting by Mothership. Mr Ong's story and words belong to that reporting; the price analysis, the framing and the opinions are ours.

It is opinion and general information, not financial, CPF or property advice, and not a valuation of any flat. Check your own eligibility with HDB and CPF before you plan a move.

Published 20 October 2026.