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Issues with assessment of SRX's HDB data

Jul 9, 2016


While we respect ERA Realty key executive officer Eugene Lim's expert analysis on property markets ("HDB resale volume stays flat"; yesterday), he made two technical and factual errors in his assessment of SRX Property's HDB data. We would like to correct the record.

First, contrary to Mr Lim's statement, SRX's figures are based on the most real-time and comprehensive property transaction data available and do include do-it-yourself transactions in HDB.

Second, SRX's figures are based on monthly changes while HDB's flash reports are based on quarterly changes. Mr Lim employed the wrong methodology to approximate the quarterly change from SRX's monthly figures. This gave rise to the erroneous 0.4 per cent quarterly drop that was reported.

When one employs the right methodology for comparison, both HDB's and SRX's figures would be similar, but not exact, since no conversion from a monthly methodology to that of a quarterly one is perfect.

Moreover, HDB's flash figures may not take into account all of June's transactions, while SRX's figures do. Therefore, it would be more appropriate to convert SRX's monthly figures to quarterly and compare it to that of the HDB after the latter releases its full report in a few weeks' time.

By following a monthly reporting, SRX's figures are more real-time than those of HDB's quarterly flash report.

For more details on this correction or additional information on our SRX Property indexes, visit www.srx.com.sg/price-index

Jeremy Lee

Chief Technology Officer

SRX Property