SINGAPORE'S SHRINKING HOMES

As households get smaller and real-estate prices keep rising, small-space living is increasingly the norm in the Republic

- Teo Kai Xiang

Mr Jon Phua (above) lives in a shoebox condominium apartment that forms part of a trend towards smaller private residences. To save space, he has retrofitted an airplane galley cart into a portable coffee table (left) and, instead of a dining table, he eats at a desk that doubles as his workspace (below).

(ST PHOTOS: JASEL POH)

At 43 sq m, Mr Jon Phua's condominium unit in Hougang places at the cosier end of the living-space scale.

The one-bedroom shoebox apartment, which works out to be 463 sq ft, has no dining table. The 37-year-old former flight attendant eats at a desk that doubles as his workspace. His coffee table is a retrofitted plane galley cart that can be moved around to serve as an end table. A bedside ledge functions as a table and storage space.

Mr Phua bought a new 99-year leasehold home in 2021 to avoid an overly burdensome loan for a small home of his own. In 2025, one-bedroom units in his complex resold for between $750,000 and $869,000.

The alternative - waiting until he was 35 to buy an HDB flat on the resale market - seemed intolerable at the time. As a communications professional, his decision was made after spending long stretches of the Covid-19 pandemic working remotely from the tight confines of his parents' four-room Housing Board flat.

Such small-space living represents a growing trend in what life in Singapore looks like.

SINGAPORE'S LIVING SPACE IN NUMBERS

In 1995, the average floor area of non-landed private residences up for new sale transactions was 118 sq m, according to an analysis of Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) data by real estate consultancy Knight Frank Singapore. By 2025, that figure had fallen to 83 sq m.

A similar trend can be seen in the decreasing average floor area of condo resale units. Some HDB flat types have seen similar dips over the past decades too.