Singapore second most expensive world class city to buy a house

Moscow, with virtually no purchase cost, was the cheapest of the ten world class cities.

According to Savills Research & Consultancy, taxes and levies can add significantly to the cost of buying for executive Unit. if the costs of buying, selling and occupation taxes are added together over a five year period and apportioned on an annual basis, they can add up to a significant proportion of value.

In the cities that are most expensive to transact and occupy – Singapore, New York, Paris, Mumbai and tokyo – this amounts to over 2% of value on an annual basis. The cheapest cities in which to buy and occupy are London and Moscow.

In some countries, Savills noted that purchase costs can add 10% or more to the price of a property – and some countries are imposing huge penalties for ‘flipping’ or buying and selling property within a short timeframe – adding even further to the possible costs of ownership.

"Consequently in cities where yields are low, the annualised cost of simply buying a property may not be significantly different from the entire costs of renting. The corporate decision to grant rental allowances rather than allowing expatriates to buy in these cities might be a pertinent one," it said

Here's analysis of the purchase costs of ten world class cities by Savills:

Hong Kong is the most expensive of our cities in which to purchase property, reflecting the high initial cost of property and stamp duty (3% to 4.25%).

Singapore ranks second. The city state recently announced an additional 10% stamp duty to be levied on foreigners’ property purchases in an attempt to cool the market. For permanent residents, an
additional 3% is imposed on second and subsequent residential properties, and 3% for singaporeans buying their third andsubsequent property. These measures arein addition to existing stamp duty costs.

This is likely to have an impact on sales,and prices, particularly in the upper tiers of the Singapore market.

Paris is third, with purchase costs on resale property around 6.5% of property value, comprising registration and ‘notaire’, or official legal fees. At the other end of the spectrum, Moscow has virtually no purchase costs (just a $300 registry fee), legal fees are covered in the agency fee paid by the seller,
and there is no stamp duty