Marcus & Hui Ling Want a Million-Dollar Flat in Toa Payoh. We Ran the Numbers.

In the first quarter of 2026, the HDB resale index did something it had not done in nearly seven years — it fell, by 0.1%. In the same three months, a record 412 flats changed hands at a million dollars or more, up almost a fifth on the quarter before. Both facts are true at once: the broad market cooled while the top of it ran hot. Toa Payoh alone logged 72 million-dollar sales, and the median four-room there is now $1.0 million — not a headline outlier, but what a typical buyer pays.

So when a couple sits across the table and says they want one, the question is no longer "is that crazy." It is "what does it actually cost, and what are you buying for the premium." Here is that math, run end to end.

Marcus and Hui Ling are a composite — a profile we built from typical figures, not real clients. The numbers below are the real workings for the stated assumptions.

The couple and the flat

Marcus and Hui Ling are both 36, first-timers, with a combined income of $12,000 a month. They are eyeing a $1.04 million four-room resale in Toa Payoh, close to her parents and a five-minute walk to the MRT. They have about $250,000 in combined CPF and $90,000 in cash.

Start with what they get back from the state. At $12,000 income they are under the $14,000 ceiling for the CPF Housing Grant (Family), worth $80,000 for a resale flat up to four-room. They are above the $9,000 ceiling for the Enhanced CPF Housing Grant, so they get nothing there. One grant, $80,000, and that is the extent of the help on a million-dollar flat.

The financing, line by line

At 75% loan-to-value, the HDB loan is $780,000 and the downpayment is $260,000 (25%). The $80,000 grant offsets the downpayment, leaving about $180,000 to find from CPF and cash — comfortably inside their savings. On top of that sits Buyer's Stamp Duty of $26,200, payable in cash or CPF.

The monthly is where the flat bites. A $780,000 HDB loan at the 2.6% concessionary rate over 25 years is $3,539 a month. That matters because HDB flats are bound by the Mortgage Servicing Ratio: your instalment cannot exceed 30% of gross income. Thirty percent of $12,000 is $3,600 — so Marcus and Hui Ling clear the ceiling by $61 a month. They qualify, but only just, and only on the HDB loan. Price the same loan at a 3.0% bank rate and the instalment is $3,699 — above the $3,600 MSR ceiling, which means a bank loan on this flat is off the table for them entirely. The million-dollar flat does not leave them a choice of lender; it leaves them one option, at the edge of the rules.

The cost that does not appear on any statement

There is one more number, and it is the one that quietly decides whether a million-dollar flat is a good store of value: CPF accrued interest. Every dollar Marcus and Hui Ling take from CPF — the downpayment and the monthly instalments — would have earned 2.5% a year sitting in their Ordinary Account. When they eventually sell, they must return that money plus the interest it would have earned to their CPF before they see a cent of cash profit.

The scale is not trivial. The $260,000 downpayment alone accrues about $72,800 in CPF interest over ten years. Add the accrued interest on the principal they repay from CPF over the same decade — roughly another $33,000 — and they are looking at over $100,000 of CPF that must be topped back up from the sale price before any gain is "real." On a flat with a 99-year lease that is decaying the whole time and has no en-bloc upside, that accrued-interest claw-back is the difference between a flat that feels like an appreciating asset and one that is closer to expensive, comfortable consumption.

So is it worth it?

The honest answer is: sometimes, and for reasons that are not financial. The four-room in Toa Payoh costs $490,000 more than the median four-room in a non-mature town like Jurong West or Woodlands — an 89% premium. That premium buys three real things: a central location, a five-minute walk to the MRT, and being around the corner from ageing parents. Those are worth paying for if they are worth it to you. What the premium does not buy is a better investment. A million-dollar flat is a high quantum on a depreciating lease, financed at the very edge of the MSR, with a six-figure CPF claw-back waiting at the far end. It is not a wealth-building machine; it is a home you are paying a mature-town premium to live in.

For Marcus and Hui Ling, the deciding question was never the spreadsheet — it was whether proximity to her parents was worth $490,000 and a decade of tight cash flow. That is a fair thing to buy. The mistake is buying it while believing you are buying an asset. Run your own version before a viewing convinces you otherwise: price the loan against the MSR ceiling, add the stamp duty, and put the CPF accrued interest in the model from day one. If the home is still worth it once the premium is named honestly, then it is worth it.

Sources: Stacked Homes — Q1 2026 HDB resale analysis (412 million-dollar flats; Toa Payoh median; first index decline since 2Q2019); HDB — CPF Housing Grants; CPF — accrued interest on housing. Loan, stamp-duty, and accrued-interest figures computed for the stated assumptions; grant ceilings and MSR as at June 2026.

Marcus and Hui Ling are an illustrative composite, not real clients. Silas Tan is a District Director at Huttons Asia and co-founder of TRIBE. He built the Resale Project Scorecard (RPS) using 126,000+ URA REALIS transactions. This article is for informational purposes and does not constitute financial or investment advice. CEA Registration R000303I.