How long does it take to sell an HDB flat from start to finish?

Roughly 12 to 16 weeks once you have a buyer. After registering Intent to Sell you must wait 7 days before granting an Option to Purchase. The OTP is valid for 21 calendar days. After the buyer exercises the OTP and the Resale Application is submitted, HDB takes up to 28 working days to accept the application and the resale completes about 8 weeks from that acceptance date.

Do I need a property agent to sell my HDB flat?

No. Selling without an agent is allowed and the entire process runs through My Flat Dashboard on the HDB Flat Portal. Some sellers still use agents for marketing, viewings and negotiation, but the commission is privately negotiated between you and the agent, not fixed by HDB.

What is the resale levy and how much is it?

The resale levy applies if you sell a subsidised HDB flat and then buy another subsidised flat or a developer Executive Condominium. The fixed amounts are $15,000 for 2-room sellers buying a larger flat, $30,000 for 3-room, $40,000 for 4-room, $45,000 for 5-room and $50,000 for Executive flats. You can pay it at resale or defer to your next HDB purchase, with deferred amounts charged interest at 5% per annum. The levy must be paid in cash, not from CPF savings or your housing loan.

When do I receive the sale proceeds?

The buyer's payment is settled at the resale completion appointment, which falls about 8 weeks after HDB accepts the Resale Application. From the sale price, HDB deducts your outstanding housing loan (if any), refunds the CPF you originally used plus accrued interest back into your CPF Ordinary Account, and pays any resale levy you owe. What is left is your cash proceeds.

Can I sell before completing the Minimum Occupation Period?

Generally no. The MOP for a Standard HDB flat is 5 years and 10 years for Plus and Prime flats. Selling before MOP requires HDB approval, which is granted only in exceptional cases such as divorce, death or serious financial hardship, and is decided case by case.

Selling your HDB flat

How to sell your HDB flat, step by step

8 min read Verified against hdb.gov.sg, 7 April 2026 No agent affiliation

Selling an HDB flat in Singapore is a structured five-step process that runs through My Flat Dashboard on the HDB Flat Portal. Once you have a buyer in hand, the formal HDB timeline takes roughly 12 to 16 weeks: a 7-day cooling-off period, up to 21 days for the buyer to exercise the Option to Purchase, up to 28 working days for HDB to accept the Resale Application, and about 8 weeks from acceptance to completion. The variable part is how long it takes you to find that buyer. This page walks through each official step, the timing rules HDB enforces, the costs you should set aside from your sale proceeds, and the situations that trip up the most sellers.

The short version

Five mandatory steps, all on My Flat Dashboard

Register your Intent to Sell using Singpass, this triggers a mandatory 7-day cooling-off period.
List your flat (on the HDB Flat Portal, on your own, or through an agent) and find a buyer.
Grant the buyer the HDB-prescribed Option to Purchase, valid for 21 calendar days.
After the buyer exercises the OTP, both parties submit the Resale Application within 7 days of each other.
HDB accepts within 28 working days, then resale completion is about 8 weeks later.

The official five-step process

Register your Intent to Sell

Where: My Flat Dashboard Cost: free Triggers: 7-day cooling-off

Log in to My Flat Dashboard on the HDB Flat Portal using Singpass and register an Intent to Sell. You will get back, in one place, the information you need to plan the sale: a preliminary assessment of your eligibility to sell, the date you may grant an Option to Purchase to a buyer, your block's Ethnic Integration Policy and Singapore Permanent Resident quota status, any upgrading status and outstanding upgrading bills, and recent transacted prices of nearby flats so you can sanity-check your asking price.

Registering an Intent to Sell is also when you should think about your next housing. HDB asks you to plan this before you commit to the sale, because the moment you grant an OTP and the buyer exercises it, you have started a chain that ends with you handing over the keys.

The 7-day cooling-off period: from the moment you register your Intent to Sell, you must wait 7 calendar days before you may grant an Option to Purchase to any buyer. This is a mandatory rule HDB enforces, not a recommendation. Use the time to finalise your asking price, prepare the flat for viewings and confirm your next housing plan.

Source: HDB, Intent to Sell

List your flat and find a buyer

Where: HDB Flat Portal · open market Cost: free to list Time: variable

Once your Intent to Sell is registered, you may list your flat on the official Resale Flat Listing service on the HDB Flat Portal. The listing form auto-populates the address, flat type and floor area from HDB's records, so you only need to add photos and a description. Listing is free and there is no exclusivity, so you may also advertise the flat on PropertyGuru, 99.co or any other platform, with or without an agent.

Most sellers use this stage to handle viewings and negotiate the price. There is no HDB rule about how long this takes, it depends entirely on demand for your flat type, location and lease remaining. The 7-day cooling-off period from Step 1 must elapse before you may move on to granting an OTP, but the listing itself can go up immediately.

Source: HDB, Selling a Flat overview

Grant the Option to Purchase

Document: HDB-prescribed OTP Option Fee: $1 to $1,000 Validity: 21 calendar days

When you and the buyer agree on a price, you grant them an Option to Purchase. HDB requires you to use the prescribed OTP form, which you download from My Flat Dashboard after registering your Intent to Sell. The prescribed form is the only document HDB will recognise for a resale transaction.

The buyer pays an Option Fee of any amount between $1 and $1,000, mutually agreed between the two of you. This is collected from the buyer when you grant the OTP. The OTP is then valid for 21 calendar days, during which the buyer must:

Have a valid HDB Flat Eligibility (HFE) Letter.
If they are using a bank loan, hold a valid Letter of Offer from their bank, dated on or before the OTP exercise date.
Sign and return the OTP to you to formally exercise it.

If the buyer does not exercise within 21 days, the OTP lapses. You keep the Option Fee. The buyer walks away with no further obligation, and you are free to grant a new OTP to a different buyer. This is where most sellers learn how serious a buyer really is.

Source: HDB, Option to Purchase

Submit the Resale Application

Where: My Flat Dashboard Window: 7 days of each other Acceptance: up to 28 working days

After the buyer exercises the OTP, both you and the buyer submit your respective portions of the Resale Application through My Flat Dashboard. There are two timing rules you must respect simultaneously:

Within the number of days specified on page 4 of the OTP form (the seller fills this in when granting the OTP).
Within 7 calendar days of each other's submission. If you submit first, the buyer has 7 days to submit their half, and vice versa.

HDB then verifies the eligibility of both parties and reviews the supporting documents. Once everything is in order, HDB will notify both parties of acceptance within 28 working days, by SMS and email. This acceptance date is the start of the formal completion countdown.

Source: HDB, Resale Application

Endorse, pay, and attend the resale completion

Window: ~8 weeks from acceptance Documents: ready ~3 weeks in Final step: completion appointment

From the date HDB accepts the Resale Application, the resale completes in about 8 weeks. About 3 weeks into that window, HDB prepares the legal documents that you and the buyer will need to endorse. You handle the endorsement and the fee payment online through My Flat Dashboard, nothing is paper any more.

The completion date stated in the acceptance email is the earliest possible date. HDB cannot bring it forward, but you and the buyer may mutually agree on a later date by submitting a request through MyRequest@HDB. On the completion date, you attend the resale completion appointment, the buyer's payment is settled, and the legal title to the flat changes hands.

From the sale price, HDB will deduct your outstanding HDB housing loan if you have one, refund the CPF Ordinary Account savings you originally used for the flat plus accrued interest back into your CPF, and deduct any resale levy you owe (see costs section below). What is left is your cash sale proceeds, paid to you by cashier's order.

Source: HDB, Resale Completion

Costs to set aside from your sale proceeds

The headline sale price is not what you walk away with. HDB deducts several items at the completion appointment, and there are private costs (legal, agent) that you settle separately. Plan for these from day one of your Intent to Sell.

Cost	Amount	When
Resale levy (only if buying another subsidised flat or developer EC)	$15,000 – $50,000	Cash, deducted from sale proceeds or deferred to next purchase
HDB legal/conveyancing fees (if you use HDB as your conveyancer)	Use HDB calculator	Online, during the 8-week completion window
Private lawyer fees (if you use a private conveyancer)	Negotiable	Settled separately with the lawyer
Property agent commission (if you use one)	Negotiable	Settled with the agent under your private agreement
CPF refund (principal you withdrew + accrued interest)	Returned to your CPF OA	Auto-deducted at resale completion
Outstanding HDB loan, if any	Auto-redeemed from proceeds	At resale completion

The resale levy in detail

If you sell your subsidised HDB flat and then buy another subsidised flat, or buy an Executive Condominium directly from a developer, you owe a resale levy. HDB will tell you whether you owe one when you register your Intent to Sell. The amount depends on the flat type you are selling, not the one you are buying:

$15,000, 2-room flat sellers buying a larger flat type
$30,000, 3-room flat
$40,000, 4-room flat
$45,000, 5-room flat
$50,000, Executive flat

You can settle the levy at the resale completion (deducted from your proceeds in cash) or defer it until you actually buy your next flat. Deferred levies attract interest at 5% per annum. The resale levy must be paid in cash, you cannot use CPF savings or your housing loan to cover it.

Source: HDB, Resale Levy

Common questions sellers ask

How long does the whole process take from start to finish?

Roughly 12 to 16 weeks from the moment you have a buyer in hand. The mandatory waits are: 7 days cooling-off after Intent to Sell, up to 21 days for the buyer to exercise the OTP, up to 28 working days for HDB to accept the Resale Application, and about 8 weeks from acceptance to the completion appointment. The variable parts are how long it takes you to find a buyer and how quickly the buyer's HFE letter and bank Letter of Offer come through.

Do I have to use a property agent?

No. Selling without an agent is fully supported by HDB. The Resale Flat Listing service on the HDB Flat Portal lets you list directly, and the entire transaction runs through My Flat Dashboard. Many sellers still use an agent for marketing, viewings and negotiation, especially for first-time sellers. Agent commission is privately negotiated between you and the agent, not fixed by HDB.

What if I am downgrading or upgrading at the same time?

Most sellers in Singapore are also buyers, and HDB expects you to plan your next housing before you grant an OTP. The two transactions run in parallel: your sale proceeds and CPF refund are credited at your sale completion, then they fund your purchase completion. Timing the two completions to line up is the hardest part. The standard buffer is 6 to 8 weeks, plus a temporary rental if there is a gap.

Can I sell before completing my Minimum Occupation Period?

Generally no. The MOP for a Standard HDB flat is 5 years from the date your purchase was legally completed, not from key collection. For Plus and Prime flats it is 10 years. Selling before MOP requires HDB approval and is granted only on a case-by-case basis in exceptional circumstances such as divorce, death, or serious financial hardship. There is no published rule book for these waivers, HDB decides each case individually.

When do I actually receive the cash?

At the resale completion appointment, about 8 weeks after HDB accepts the Resale Application. The buyer's payment is settled, HDB deducts your outstanding loan, refunds CPF, and deducts any resale levy. The remaining cash proceeds are paid to you by cashier's order. There is no separate payout window after completion, the appointment is when the money changes hands.

Sources and verification

All facts on this page were checked against the above sources on 7 April 2026. HDB rules and timelines do change, if you are about to act, click through to the official source to confirm the figure still holds.