House Bites #1: SBF May 2016

It’s finally about time I talk about our house! I’ve been wanting to write about this since the beginning, but there was nothing to write about because we literally haven’t secured a house at that time. But now, alhamdulillah it is 75% secure hehehe.

Our journey to getting a house wasn’t a smooth one. I have actually been bugging H to start applying for BTO since early last year, way before he graduated because everyone knows that BTO houses take 5 years to build and renovate. Most couples I know only get their BTO flats by the time they have their first or second baby. We want to avoid that situation. The faster we can get our own place, the better. So ya, persuading H wasn’t easy especially since he was still in school and all his friends have not even thought much about marriage or house at that point of time.

So we finally applied for a BTO in Hougang in November 2015 for the first time. The demand was HUGE because they combined the August and November BTO launches together right after the government doubled the SHG grant from $20k to $40k during the national day rally. We were anxious and excited, but we didn’t even get a ballot number because there were simply too many applicants.

We tried again, this time for a BTO in Sengkang, in February 2016, but again, no ballot number. It felt quite disappointing to be rejected again the second time, and by then I macam dah tawar hati because H was going to start work soon and we would be qualified for a much lesser amount of grant once our combined income increased significantly. So we contemplated on getting a resale flat, but figured we might as well try  our luck for the May Sale of Balance first. It was going to be either Bedok or Tampines, which is where our parents live. So we decided on Bedok because it has a lot more balance flats than Tampines for Malays.

And alhamdulillah, last month, we got our ballot number, which is a single digit!! It felt like a miracle. The only unfortunate thing is that our grant amount is also significantly reduced. Oh wells, not our rezeki but Allah is fair like that. We have not gotten our first appointment date yet, but they said the selection excercise will start in October, which is very soon!

So yup, will write about it again probably after we select our flat!