By The Address desk · Last verified 12 October 2026
You can use your CPF Ordinary Account (OA) to pay the downpayment, monthly loan instalments, stamp duty and legal fees on a Singapore home. For a resale flat or private property, the cap is the Valuation Limit: the lower of the purchase price or the valuation. With a bank loan, you can go up to the Withdrawal Limit of 120% of that figure, but only if you have set aside the Basic Retirement Sum. The property’s remaining lease must also cover the youngest buyer to age 95, or usage is pro-rated. When you sell, you refund every CPF dollar used plus accrued interest, compounded at the OA rate, which is 2.5% a year as of October 2026.
CPF is the reason most Singaporeans can own a home at all, so it pays to know where the ceilings sit before you sign anything. Here is the whole picture, in plain words.
Quick facts
- Only Ordinary Account savings can be used for housing.
- The Valuation Limit (VL) is the lower of the purchase price and the valuation at the time of purchase.
- With a bank loan, usage can rise to 120% of the VL once the prevailing Basic Retirement Sum is set aside.
- The remaining lease should cover the youngest CPF-using buyer to age 95; otherwise usage is pro-rated.
- Generally, a property needs at least 20 years of remaining lease before CPF can be used at all.
- On sale, you refund the principal plus accrued interest to your own CPF account; you keep that money, it is not a fee.
The two limits: Valuation Limit and Withdrawal Limit
CPF measures your usage against one base figure: the lower of what you paid and what the property was valued at. That is the Valuation Limit. If you pay above valuation (Cash Over Valuation on an HDB resale, or a shortfall on a private purchase), that extra must come from cash, never CPF.
What happens once you hit the VL depends on the flat and the loan, according to the CPF Board:
| Property and loan | CPF OA usage limit |
|---|---|
| New HDB flat from HDB, with an HDB loan | Full purchase price, including the loan |
| Resale HDB flat, with an HDB loan | Up to the VL; beyond that, OA can keep paying the remaining HDB loan if the Basic Retirement Sum is set aside |
| HDB or private property, with a bank loan | Up to the VL; beyond that, up to 120% of the VL (the Withdrawal Limit) if the Basic Retirement Sum is set aside |
| Any property whose lease cannot cover the youngest buyer to age 95 | Pro-rated cap on usage; once reached, no more OA can be used even with the Basic Retirement Sum set aside |
Once you cross the ceiling that applies to you, every further instalment is paid in cash. On a long bank loan, that switch can come years before the loan ends, so plan your cash flow for it early. CPF’s housing usage calculator shows where your own ceiling sits.
A worked example
Say you buy a resale flat for $500,000, it is valued at $490,000, and you take a bank loan. The figures below are illustrative; your own limits come from CPF.
- Valuation Limit: the lower of $500,000 and $490,000, so $490,000.
- Cash premium: the $10,000 paid above valuation must be cash.
- Withdrawal Limit: 120% of $490,000 is $588,000, available only if you have set aside the Basic Retirement Sum.
- Above $588,000: total CPF used across downpayment, instalments and interest stops here; anything more is cash.
Notice the limits count interest paid on the loan too, not just the principal. That is why a long bank loan can reach the ceiling sooner than people expect.
Accrued interest: what it is and why you pay it back
CPF savings exist mainly for retirement. Money taken out for a home stops earning CPF interest, so when the home is sold, you return the principal plus the interest it would have earned, compounded annually at the prevailing OA rate from the date you first used it. The refund goes back into your own CPF account. Under 55, it lands in your OA; from 55, it first tops up your Retirement Account to the required sum, with the balance to your OA.
Here is how it grows, using the 2.5% OA base rate on a single lump sum (real usage is spread over many months, so actual figures differ):
| CPF used | Years held | Principal plus interest at 2.5% |
|---|---|---|
| $100,000 | 5 | about $113,141 |
| $100,000 | 10 | about $128,008 |
| $100,000 | 20 | about $163,862 |
Interest keeps accruing even after your loan is fully paid, because it runs on the savings withdrawn, not on the loan. When you sell, proceeds clear the outstanding loan first, then the CPF refund. If you sell the whole property at market value and the proceeds fall short, the CPF Board says you refund the selling price less the outstanding loan, and you do not need to top up the shortfall in cash. Option money paid to you in cash counts as part of the selling price and goes into the refund too.
Should you make a voluntary housing refund?
You can return CPF used for housing at any time with a voluntary housing refund. It stops further accrued interest on the amount returned, and the money earns CPF interest instead. It also leaves more cash in hand when you sell. The trade-off is that the cash is locked in CPF under the usual withdrawal rules. CPF also lets you keep up to $20,000 in your OA when you buy, as a buffer for instalments in hard times.
The WahLiao Verdict
Use CPF for your home without guilt; it was built for exactly this. Just do three things first: run CPF’s housing usage calculator on the flat you want, check the lease reaches the youngest buyer’s 95th birthday, and budget the cash for any premium over valuation and for the years after you hit the ceiling. And when you plan to sell, look at the “What Happens If” figures in your CPF home ownership dashboard so the accrued interest is a number you expected, not a surprise.
Questions people ask
Is accrued interest money I lose?
No. It goes back into your own CPF account and keeps earning interest. It reduces the cash you take home from a sale, but it rebuilds your retirement savings.
Can I use CPF to pay Cash Over Valuation?
No. CPF usage is measured against the lower of price and valuation, so anything paid above valuation must be cash.
What if the flat’s lease does not last until I am 95?
You can still use CPF if the remaining lease is at least 20 years, but the amount is pro-rated. CPF’s housing usage calculator shows the exact cap for a given flat and buyer age.
Do I have to top up in cash if my sale makes a loss?
Not if you sell the whole property at market value. The CPF Board says you refund the selling price less the outstanding loan, and you need not top up the shortfall in cash.
Sources: CPF Board, how much CPF you can use for a home; CPF Board, CPF refund when selling or transferring property; CPF Board, why accrued interest is refunded; CPF Board, current CPF interest rates; CPF Board, housing usage calculator. The Address explains; it does not advise.
Read next: HDB Loan or Bank Loan: LTV, MSR and TDSR Explained · What a 99-Year Lease Means: Lease Decay, CPF Rules and Redevelopment · Back to The Address
For what’s worth it this week, with the bill shown, read The WahLiao Week.
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