This week the government announced higher CPF grants and a raised income ceiling for first-time HDB buyers. More citizens are now eligible to buy new BTO flats or resale HDB flats.
A recent advertisement from the CPF Board is seen at MRT platforms with a headline that reads,
“In 2018, nearly one million Singaporeans used CPF for their housing and found what really sparks joy.”
Did you remember the joy you had when you bought your first HDB flat?
Are you happy that you can use your CPF money to pay off your home loan?
Is owning your home increases life satisfaction or creates more stress in your everyday life?
Have you been grateful or upset when the value of your home rise or drop at a certain time?
Will you worry about aging, depreciation and the expiring lease of your home one day?
Are you concerned about money being tied up by your home and want to rightsize before retirement?
Home ownership = happiness?
With National Day a month behind us, do you still recall the last line of the Singapore National Pledge?
Yes, it is “to achieve happiness, prosperity and progress for our nation”.
After fifty-four years, Singapore has definitely achieved prosperity and made much progress. But what about happiness?
According to the 2019 World Happiness Report, Singapore ranks only 34th in the list. The happiest countries in the world are Finland, Demark and Norway.
The Nordic countries have a home ownership rate between 60 to 80 percent, which is much lower than the 91.5 percent of Singapore. So why are we not happier?
If majority of us are owners of our home, why are we still unhappy?
We can calculate ROI and cash-on-cash return to determine whether a property is a good investment. But there is no formula to determine whether the purchase of a home is a good investment to increase our happiness.
I am reading Elizabeth Dunn and Michael Norton’s book Happy Money: The Science of Smarter Spending.
According to a US survey in 2011, almost 90 percent of Americans regard home ownership as a central part of the American dream. Note that this is true even after the US housing market collapsed during the subprime crisis.
However, the study shows that housing seems to play a small role in the successful pursuit of happiness. Homeowners aren’t any happier than renters.
The authors explains that there is “diminished savoring” in material things and their enjoyment declines inevitably with time.
Research shows that buying experiences provide much more happiness than buying possessions, especially when those experiences we spend money on align with our own values.
That is true. We often hear people regret buying something. But we seldom hear people regret trying a new venture, such as going for a concert or visiting a new country.
Experiences provide more happiness than material goods because experiences are more likely to make us feel socially connected to others. They often leave with us a memorable story that we can retell for years to come. That is how experiences provide better value-for-money than possessions.
The same theory applies to buying our home. The physical possession of a home won’t make us happy for very long. It is the excitement of buying our home for the first time and the happy memories with our loved ones living in our home that bring us joy in life.
It is not what and where we are staying. It is who and whom we are staying with that matters.
Why our home can make us unhappy
A 12-year-old was accepted by a prestigious secondary school in Bukit Timah. He came back from school and told his parents that his friends are all staying in condominiums or landed houses. He is the only one living in an HDB flat.
What will his parents think? Will they think it’s fine because 80 percent of the population are staying in HDB flats? Will they feel the pressure to keep up with the Joneses for the sake of their kid? Will they feel the bitterness of not being able to do as well as their peers despite working their butts off?
For some reason we human beings instinctively equate our self-worth with our ability to get things or achieve things … so when people don’t have money, or they can’t give money away or do things they want to because they don’t have enough money, they feel worthless. They feel powerless. And what do people who feel powerless and worthless do? They yell. They scream. They take it out on their kids.
– Ken Honda, Happy Money: The Japanese Art of Making Peace with Your Money
Last year I wrote a blog post titled “Is property the reason why Singapore is not among the happiest countries in the world?” where I pointed out two important facts:
1. We are truly satisfied with life only when we fare better when comparing with or benchmarking against people around us.
2. A society’s unhappiness level is not related to how poor it is, but rather how big the gap is between the ‘haves’ and ‘have nots’.
The sad truth is: We work very hard with long hours to make more money than we can ever derive pleasure from. And that limited pleasure subsides whenever we see people around us or hear stories about people doing much better than us.
Life is unfair.
Japanese author Ken Honda said in his book Happy Money: The Japanese Art of Making Peace with Your Money that we all have our money blueprint: Whether we think money is positive or negative depends on our past experience with money.
Money makes us unhappy because we are angry with the past and fear about the future. Many things happening around us can create uncertainties, anxieties and fear – fear of lagging behind, fear of missing out, and fear of losing what we have.
1. Fear of lagging behind
We are brainwashed by the education system, the companies, the government and the society that life is all about competitiveness, rankings and achievement. Where we live is a key parameter to measure our success in life. Buying our first home and upgrading to a better and bigger home are all important milestones.
2. Fear of missing out
Many people live with a scarcity mindset. They believe that all good things are scarce and limited in quality: New launch projects are selling out fast. Good units will soon be snapped up by early buyers. We’d better hurry and grab it before someone else does.
3. Fear of losing what we have
Because we have properties on hand and mortgages to pay, we worry about economic headwinds, job security, aging HDB flats …
The more we have, the more we are afraid of losing what we have. It is far more painful to lose what we once have than we have never had before.
4 ways to make us happy again
There are four good suggestions from the authors of the two books on how to keep us happy while owning our home:
1. Stop comparing and start living
We live for ourselves, not for others. Drop the bad habit to constantly benchmark ourselves against others. The person who is really judging ourselves and competing against us is we ourselves. And our happiness becomes relative to others’ achievement.
Be grateful for what we have. If not, we will be controlled by the monster in ourselves that always tells us we aren’t having enough. No matter how much we have, our self-image and self-esteem will never improve.
Ask ourselves: Do we prefer to be less happy, or be happy with less?
2, Take a zen approach to money
Forget about the past and the future that can rob our present happiness. Live in the present moment.
Knowing that all things can’t last forever make us appreciate them more. What’s the problem of a 99-year lease when homes in other countries are only sold for 30 to 60 years?
Always place personal growth and fulfillment above material goods and financial success. Stop attaching our sense of security to only money. We have more freedom and options than we realize. And soon we will discover the freedom that comes with not worrying incessantly about money.
The opposite of fear is trust – unconditional acceptance of the past and what will happen in the future. Trust that things will work out. Peace of mind is the source of happiness.
3. Shift out of the scarcity mindset
One way of avoiding falling into the “kiasu” trap is to shift away from the scarcity mindset to the abundant mindset.
The property market is not a zero-sum game. There is abundant supply in the supply pipeline. When we look at the right places at the right time, there will be plenty of good deals and great offers out there.
As I said in my book No BS Guide to Property Investment, developers always save the best for last when marketing their projects. The rationale is: If they can sell units which are difficult to move, the rest of the better units can definitely be sold.
4. Stand by our values
Why is the market flooded with sleazy schemes promoting own multiple properties with no money down; sell your HDB and buy two private properties with no ABSD, etc.?
Because some people believe that they need to betray their own values, deceive and control others in order to make money.
They don’t know that by being true to ourselves and share our passion, knowledge and abilities, we will receive appreciation and gratitude from others in the form of money.
Leading a life consistent with one’s values is the greatest prediction of happiness. When we act on your values, we feel satisfied. When we do not, it becomes a source of confusion, distrust and frustration.
One day when the industry stakeholders – the media, developers, agencies and banks – can contain their own insecurities, and stop playing with numbers and start sharing the true picture, they will certainly receive more trust, respect and business from us.
I will be re-running the How to Buy Good Quality Properties Workshop on November 16. Don’t miss it if you want to learn from my honest sharing of how to pick the best project, direction, facing, layout, fengshui, etc. in BTO, condo or landed project. Sign up now and see you there!
4 WAYS to MAKE US HAPPY AGAIN
I could not help BUT make the following comments:
1. I am in general agreement with the gist of your latest publication which is a well written piece that everybody can make use of and apply if indeed we want to lead a more peaceful and happier life.
2. Except that there will always be comparisons without which how do we get better, how is it that inventions are created for the purpose of having something better can happen?
3.Even the title you have chosen would suggest some form of comparison is inevitable. How else does one know how to be “happier” if not for some comparison laterally across the landscape or historically with the past? How does comparing home ownership with other countries come into play if not the asking of being ‘grateful’ or ‘contentment’ is a pre-requisite for being ‘happy’?
4. Which leads me to the point of having the need or especially in our political context the ‘dare’ to compare, even though we may or may not be necessarily happier in the process. Without this comparison and just accepting the status quo, the majority of us may just be ‘blinded’ into accepting if we do no discuss or debate what could have been the better for us.
5. As such I would suggest “Compare by All Means IF THIS LEADS TO POSITIVE ACTIONS” in improving one’s lot and NOT ” COMPARE then FEEL MISERABLE and FILLED WITH NEGATIVE THOUGHTS” in the process.
The theme of the article is not about “not to compare”, but “not to compare with the others”. Instead, you should always compare with you yourself. Because if you are comparing with the others, what if you are benchmarking against the wrong persons? What if you are already the best, and right at the beginning? Do you sit there and don’t have to do anything then?
Only you yourself is worth comparing: What is your progress when comparing with your ultimate goal? How do you fare today compared with yesterday? Are you a better person now? Are you happier and satisfied with life? Have you become more human (Tuesdays with Morrie)? Are you contributing more to the community and the society compared with last time? …