Stalled Condo Listing Singapore: How a Bank Valuation Gap Kept a $1.9M Unit Unsold for 5 Months

Expert takeaway: In 2026, a stalled condo listing usually comes down to the gap between the asking price and what banks will value the unit at. Staging and photos matter much less. Once the price sits within reach of the valuation and the buyer's cash, a well-located unit tends to sell quickly.

Imran and Farah listed their three-bedroom condo near Kovan MRT (District 19) on 9 March 2026 at $2,080,000. Five months later they had hosted 34 viewings, turned down one offer and watched two keen buyers walk away. The unit was still unsold, and Imran had already started his new job in Melbourne. A new agent or fresh photos did not fix it. A one-page sheet of the buyer's numbers did, and the unit sold at $1.9M within 4 weeks of the relaunch.

March to August: 34 Viewings and No Deal

The couple, both Singapore Citizens in their 40s with two children, bought the 1,238 sqft unit in 2016 for $1,350,000. It sits in a 99-year leasehold project completed in 2014, about eight minutes' walk from Kovan station on the North East Line. Imran's company offered him a long-term role in Melbourne, and after looking at softening OCR rents they chose to sell rather than become overseas landlords.

They set the $2,080,000 asking price (about $1,680 psf) from one transaction: a $2,050,000 sale in their block in late 2025. That unit was on a high floor, fully renovated and had an unblocked view. Theirs is mid-floor with the original 2014 kitchen.

In week three, an HDB upgrader couple offered $1,880,000. Imran and Farah said no. "It felt like leaving $200,000 on the table," Farah said later. In April and May, two more buyers said they could pay about $2.0M. Their banks' indicative valuations both came back at $1,880,000, and both buyers pulled out before any option was signed. A cut to $1,998,000 in mid-May changed nothing, and the June school holidays cut viewings further.

The wider market gave them no help. According to URA's Q2 2026 real estate statistics, prices of private residential properties increased by 0.5% in 2nd Quarter 2026, compared with the 0.9% increase in the previous quarter. Supply is also increasing: the full-year Confirmed List supply is 9,320 units, over 50% higher than the past 10-year annual average. Even the city fringe has cooled, as covered in our analysis of RCR condo prices slipping 1.2% as resale takes a larger share of sales. In a flat market, last year's record sale tells you very little about what buyers will pay now.

Why the Stalled Condo Listing Was a Bank Valuation Problem

Here is the part many sellers miss. Under the MAS loan-to-value rules, the bank lends a percentage of the price or the valuation, whichever is lower. Any amount paid above the valuation (cash over valuation, or COV) generally has to be paid in cash, because CPF use is also tied to the lower of price and valuation. A $120,000 gap looks like 6% of the price. For the buyer, it more than doubles the cash they must find.

Here is what a first-time Singapore Citizen buyer faced. The figures assume a first housing loan at 75% LTV over 30 years, ending before the buyer turns 65, with Buyer's Stamp Duty worked out on the price paid.

The stamp duty figures follow the progressive IRAS BSD bands, including the 5% band that applies above $1.5M:

Look at the instalment row. A higher price does not raise the loan at all, because the valuation caps it. Every extra dollar comes out of the buyer's cash. The monthly instalment and income test under the MAS TDSR framework barely change, so a buyer's income can pass while their savings cannot. (Our guide on how TDSR and LTV work together explains this in more detail.) Most buyers of an OCR three-bedder are HDB upgraders, and their cash is mostly tied up in CPF and flat sale proceeds. For them, finding $214,000 in cash instead of $95,000 ended the deal.

The Psf Trap: Old Floor Areas vs Harmonised New Launches

The listing's headline also worked against them: "Three-bedder at $1,680 psf while new launches sell above $2,000 psf." Serious buyers had been to showflats and knew the harmonised floor-area rules. For development applications submitted from 1 June 2023, floor area is measured to the middle of the wall, and voids such as aircon ledges, planter boxes and high-ceiling spaces are left out of the saleable area. By 2026, most new launches follow these rules, so their psf reflects space you can actually use.

A 2014 resale unit keeps its original measurement. Imran and Farah's 1,238 sqft includes about 98 sqft of bay windows, aircon ledges and a planter.

At the original ask, the "discount to new launches" was much smaller than the listing claimed, and buyers could see it. To see how saleable area is now reported, look at the floor plans in our Canberra Crescent Residences review, a launch that uses the harmonised floor-area rules. Then compare them with any resale unit approved before June 2023. Comparing psf between two resale units measured the same way is fine. Comparing psf across the harmonisation cut-off without adjusting will mislead you.

The August Reset That Sold the Unit at $1.9M

On 10 August, five months after listing, Farah sat down with their agent and a laptop. Imran joined on WhatsApp from Melbourne. They started again from the data.

• Comparables: From URA REALIS they pulled caveats from February to July 2026. Seven comparable three-bedders in their project and two nearby projects had sold for between $1,820,000 and $1,935,000. The $2,050,000 sale was an outlier.
• Valuations: Three banks gave indicative valuations of $1,880,000, $1,900,000 and $1,900,000. If you are at this stage, first check what your unit is realistically worth against recent transactions, then ask the banks.
• Price: They relisted at $1,938,000 on 15 August, about 2% above the valuations, which left a little room to negotiate without creating a COV problem.
• Buyer cost sheet: The listing now showed the $539,600 upfront figure, the $95,000 minimum cash, the $1,425,000 loan and the income needed at $1.9M. Buyers could qualify themselves before booking a viewing.
• Honest floor area: A measured plan showed the roughly 1,140 sqft of liveable space alongside the 1,238 sqft strata figure.

The relaunch fell during the Hungry Ghost Month, when there were fewer new launches to compete with. There were fewer viewings, but the people who came were serious: 11 viewings over two weekends and two offers, at $1,880,000 and $1,900,000. They granted the Option to Purchase on 8 September at $1,900,000. The buyer's bank valued the unit at $1,900,000, so there was no COV, and the buyer exercised on 22 September, inside the 14-day option period. Completion is expected in December.

What did the five months cost? On paper, they ended up $20,000 above the March offer. Against that, interest on their outstanding $760,000 loan (about $950 a month) and maintenance of $410 a month added up to roughly $6,800 over five months. The real cost was six weeks with the family split across two countries. "We treated the first offer as an insult when it was actually information," Farah said. "It matched the bank valuation to the dollar." They also admit they spent April arguing about staging when the valuation data was available from day one. For more on the presentation side, see our guide on pricing, marketing and staging fixes for stalled listings.

Pricing a Condo Listing to Valuation: Opportunities and Risks

A five-step framework any seller can use

• Pull six months of caveats for the same size, a similar floor and the same floor-area convention. Throw out one-off outliers.
• Get two or three indicative bank valuations before listing, and keep your ask within about 2% of their median.
• Work out the buyer's numbers at your price: total upfront cost, minimum cash, and income at the 4% stress rate.
• Show strata and liveable area side by side if your project was approved before June 2023.
• Set a review trigger in advance, for example six weeks or 15 viewings without an offer near your asking price, and treat the first serious offer as data.

Opportunities: Pricing at the valuation opens your unit to the largest group of buyers, especially HDB upgraders who rely on CPF. Months without big launches keep buyers looking at resale. A clear cost sheet saves you time on viewings that were never going to turn into offers.

Risks: Valuations follow past transactions, so pricing strictly to them in a rising market can leave money on the table. A Q4 wave of new launches may pull buyers away from resale and push valuations lower. Your unit may also genuinely be better than the comparables, for example on a high floor, with a rare stack or after a full renovation. In that case, write down the evidence and expect a smaller pool of cash-rich buyers.

This case study is a composite drawn from real Singapore transactions and client scenarios; names and identifying details have been changed.

Run your own numbers: try the affordability calculator to check how much you can borrow (free, no sign-up).

Every stalled listing has its own causes, but most come back to the same numbers: the valuation, the buyer's cash and the right comparables. If your condo has been on the market longer than you expected, or you want to set the right price before listing, PropertyNet.SG can go through your comparables, likely bank valuations and buyer affordability with you and give you an independent view on where your price should be.