A 2-room flat in Queenstown sold for S$696,000, a national record for that flat type (99.co, July 2026). At the other end of the size range, the million-dollar resale flat is no longer a headline anomaly. What is more telling for anyone borrowing to buy is that most buyers of million-dollar HDB flats paid no cash-over-valuation in 2025, according to a PropNex report.
That second fact is the one that changes your sums. It means banks and HDB are appraising these flats at or above the prices being paid. To understand why that helps you, start with what cash-over-valuation actually is.
What COV is, and why it is paid in cash
When you buy a resale flat, HDB requires a valuation before the sale can proceed. Your loan, whether an HDB loan or a bank mortgage, is sized against that valuation, not against the price you agreed with the seller.
Cash-over-valuation (COV) is the gap when the agreed price is higher than the valuation. If a flat is valued at S$950,000 and you pay S$1,000,000, the S$50,000 difference is COV.
That gap cannot be financed. No HDB loan and no bank mortgage will cover it. You pay it in cash, on top of your down payment. So COV is not an abstraction. It is money that leaves your bank account and cannot come back as a loan.
Why zero COV is the good news buried in the record prices
When the PropNex report says most million-dollar buyers paid no COV, it is saying the valuations kept pace with the prices. The flats were appraised at or above what buyers paid.
That is the difference between a manageable purchase and a punishing one. Consider a S$1,000,000 flat with a bank mortgage at 75% loan-to-value (LTV), the standard maximum for a first bank loan.
If the flat is valued at S$1,000,000: you can borrow up to S$750,000, and your minimum cash and CPF down payment is S$250,000. No COV.
If the flat is valued at S$950,000: the loan is capped against the lower figure, so you can borrow up to S$712,500. You still owe the S$250,000 down payment against valuation, plus S$50,000 of COV entirely in cash. Your upfront requirement jumps.
Same price. Two very different cash demands. The valuation decides which one you face.
What this means when you make an offer
Record prices do not automatically mean you need more cash. What determines your cash burden is the gap between the price and the valuation, and in 2025 that gap was largely closing for the priciest flats.
But this is a market pattern, not a guarantee for your specific unit. Two things follow.
First, get an indicative valuation before you commit to a price. For bank loans, banks provide valuations through the HDB resale process, and you can request an indication early. This tells you whether the seller's asking price sits above or below likely valuation, which is the single most useful number in your negotiation.
Second, budget for the possibility of some COV even if the market trend is zero. If your finances only work at exactly zero COV, you have no margin. A valuation that comes in S$30,000 below your offer becomes S$30,000 of cash you did not plan for.
HDB loan or bank loan changes the LTV, not the COV rule
The COV rule is the same whichever loan you take: the gap above valuation is always cash. What differs is how much of the rest you can borrow.
An HDB loan currently offers up to 75% LTV at a concessionary rate pegged at 0.1 percentage points above the CPF Ordinary Account rate. A bank mortgage also caps at 75% LTV for a first loan, at rates set by the bank and the package you choose.
Both are sized against valuation. Neither will lend against COV. So the choice between them affects your interest cost and your down payment structure, but not the fact that any price above valuation comes out of cash.
The number to anchor on
Headline prices tell you what the market is doing. Your valuation tells you what you can borrow and how much cash you need on the day.
Before you agree a price on any resale flat, in Queenstown or anywhere else, ask for the valuation first. In a market where prices keep setting records, the valuation is what stands between the sticker and your savings account.
Sarah Chen
