Buying At District 3's Q2 2026 Median Of S$1,828,888: What The Sums Come To

This is an illustrative example built on the quarter's median price and a stated buyer profile. It is not a real purchase, not a valuation of any home, and not advice on whether or how to buy. Every figure in it is computed from recorded transactions and the tax and financing rules recorded as in force.

District 3 covers Tiong Bahru, Queenstown and Alexandra. Many buyers watching the area want one thing: the cash figure. How much is needed on day one, and what does the monthly instalment look like?

In this article, we look at an illustrative purchase at the quarter's median price. We cover stamp duty, the loan cap, the cash and CPF due at purchase, the monthly instalment, and the five-year cost of holding.

The median price for a 60 to 99 sqm private unit in the district was S$1,828,888 in Q2 2026. That figure comes from 75 recorded sales, based on caveat data from the URA Data Service. The sums around it are computed by this site's position engine.

What Does The Purchase Cost On Day One?

The buyer in this example is a Singapore citizen aged 35, buying a first home to live in. Household income is S$18,000 a month. The loan is a bank loan over 25 years.

The table below sets out the price, the stamp duty and the money due before the loan.

Stamp duty comes to S$61,044. Additional buyer's stamp duty is S$0 at 0% for this profile. The minimum cash portion is S$91,444, with a further S$365,778 payable in CPF or cash. Note that the three parts together come to S$518,266 before any loan is drawn.

How Big Can The Loan Be?

Two caps were tested here. One is the loan-to-value limit, the other is the TDSR limit. The smaller of the two binds.

The table below shows both, along with the instalment at the stated rate and at the stress rate.

The LTV cap allows S$1,371,666, or 75.0% of the price. TDSR would have allowed S$1,875,580 on the stated income. The LTV limit is therefore the binding one. The instalment is S$6,505 a month at 3%, which is 36.1% of the stated income. At the 4% stress rate used for the TDSR test, it is S$7,240.

What Does Five Years Of Holding Cost?

Buying is not the only cost. The engine also totals what the five years cost, from the fees going in to the fees on the way out.

The table below breaks that down.

Interest over the five years is S$191,459, the largest single item. Property tax and maintenance add S$26,594. Costs going in are S$64,314 and costs coming out are S$43,140. The total is S$325,507. On these assumptions, the price would need to rise 18.2% over the five years to cover that sum.

How Does The Bill Change By Buyer Profile?

Stamp duty at the same price moves sharply with who is buying. The BSD stays the same in every case. The ABSD rate is what changes.

The table below compares four profiles at S$1,828,888.

A Singapore citizen buying a first home pays S$61,044 in all. For a second home, ABSD at 20% lifts the total to S$426,821, and the LTV cap drops to 45.0%. A permanent resident buying a first home pays S$152,488. A foreigner pays S$1,158,376, with ABSD at 60%. These rates are versioned data, checked against IRAS and MAS publications.

The Sales Behind The Median

The median is only as solid as the sales under it. Here, 75 transactions in the quarter sit behind the figure.

The table below shows the count, the median price, the median size and the change over the year.

Median price per area was S$2,307 psf and the median size was 807 sqft. A year earlier, the median price was S$1,739,000, so the change is +5.2%. Note that a median can shift when the mix of projects or unit sizes shifts, not only when prices move.

Key Takeaways

At the Q2 2026 median of S$1,828,888 in District 3, a first-time citizen buyer in this example needs S$518,266 before the loan. That covers S$61,044 of stamp duty, S$91,444 in cash and S$365,778 in CPF or cash. The loan caps at S$1,371,666 under the LTV limit, with an instalment of S$6,505 a month at 3%.

These figures are indicative and built from recorded transactions and the rules recorded as in force. They are not a valuation of any home. The median tells you where the middle of 75 sales sat in the quarter. It does not tell you what any single unit would fetch, and it does not say how the mix of sales may change.

Method: an illustrative example, not a real purchase. The price is the median of the quarter's recorded sales named. The buyer is a Singapore citizen first-time owner-occupier aged 35. The stated household income is S$18,000 a month, with no other debt. The loan is the maximum, over 25 years at 3%. Stamp duty, loan limits, instalments and the five-year hold cost are computed by this site's position engine under the rules recorded as in force for the quarter. The rule versions used are bsd 2023-02-15, absd 2023-04-27, ssd 2025-07-04, ltv 2024-08-20, tdsr 2022-09-30, property_tax 2025-01-01, costs 2020-01-01. Further assumptions: sale at today's indicative mid value after 5 years. Seller pays 2% commission and S$3,000 legal fees, plus 9% GST. Mortgage interest from a standard amortisation schedule at the given rate. Loan of S$1,371,666 (75% of the price), the maximum available. Property tax on an assumed annual value of S$49,980 (85% of market rent). Maintenance at the configured norm. Rates are versioned data in config/rules.yaml, checked against IRAS and MAS publications on 2026-09-18. The newest version applied here took effect 2025-07-04. Rules change with each cooling-measure round. Private figures are from URA Data Service caveats, HDB figures from data.gov.sg resale records, both loaded weekly by this site's ingest. Medians are of the non-excluded transactions in the period named. Sales flagged by the hygiene rules (related-party transfers, bulk deals, outliers) are left out. Every figure is indicative and drawn from recorded transactions, not a formal valuation.