Today, 82% of Singaporeans live in flats organized by the HDB and satisfaction 
rate reaches 95%. 

Singapore’s successful long-term public housing strategies

By Søren Smidt-Jensen &Signe Cecilie Jochumsen Posted:  04. July 2012
International Federation for Housing and Planning
http://www.ifhp.org/ifhp-blog/singapore%E2%80%99s-successful-long-term-public-housing-strategies

Today the home ownership in Singapore is more than 90%, and the share of rental 
housing is very low. These state policies are very important for social 
stability and building the sense of nationhood

Today, Singapore is one of the densest cities in the world. Over some 60 years, 
the city has accomplished an extraordinary rise in the level of living 
conditions and the economic growth has been massive. In 1960s about 1,3 mio. of 
the 1,9 mio. lived in squatter huts, single storey sheds constructed with 
cardboards, zinc sheets, sticks and poles. Furthermore, at that time, there was 
only a weak sense of nationhood – a feeling of belonging to Singapore. In 1960, 
the Housing and Development Board (HDB) was set up to solving the nation’s 
housing crisis, and important goal of the HDB was also to push home ownership 
in order to foster a stronger sense of Singapore as the home country.

Rented apartments for the poorest people who could not afford to pay rent were 
build in large numbers in the 1960s and 1970s (some would say the modernist) 
dream), and In the mid-1980s, through public housing policies, Singapore was 
more or less slum and squatter free.

During the World Cities Summit 2012, the IFHP Travel Squad asked Dr. Cheong, 
CEO of the Housing and Development Board, responsible for about 82% of housing 
in Singapore, what the role of housing has been for the success of Singapore:

"A very important investment that the government did from the very beginning 
when the country was a young and independent country was to invest in housing. 
We made sure that our people had good and affordable housing. Today the home 
ownership in Singapore is more than 90%, and the share of rental housing is 
very low. These state policies have very important for social stability and 
building the sense of nationhood. I think that Singapore’s long-term approach 
to planning and public housing has been two very important pillars for us to 
develop to where we are today."

Dr. Cheong, CEO of the Housing and Development Board  in Singapore

Another remarkable housing policy that has been in place since the late 1970s 
is a policy to avoid ethnic segregation and instead mix the many ethnic groups. 
The policy was set in place because the governmental HDB noticed that when one 
ethnic group became predominant in certain areas, other ethnic groups would 
stay away. The purpose of the policy was to set limits for each of the 3 major 
ethnic groups (Chinese, Malay, Indian) in one housing area.  Again, a housing 
policy that had several purposes: avoiding ethnic segregation, encourage mixed 
communities and in that way build the Singaporean multicultural nationhood.

Today, 82% of Singaporeans live in flats organized by the HDB and satisfaction 
rate reaches 95%. For all of the Singaporeans together, the home ownership is 
93%, which is the highest in the world (HDB, 2012). One of the main reasons why 
home ownership is so high is that it through law is made possible to take loan 
in your personal pension-funds from the day you start earning money. In this 
way, even low-income groups can find funding to buy their own home.

Learn more about HDB at http://www.hdb.gov.sg/

Authors: 
Søren Smidt-Jensen
Signe Cecilie Jochumsen 

-- 
-- 
Please consider seriously the reason why these elite institutions are not 
discussed in the mainstream press despite the immense financial and political 
power they wield? 
There are sick and evil occultists running the Western World. They are power 
mad lunatics like something from a kids cartoon with their fingers on the 
nuclear button! Armageddon is closer than you thought. Only God can save our 
souls from their clutches, at least that's my considered opinion - Tony

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