(Bloomberg) — Singapore’s new-home sales barely rose in June, capping the weakest first half in at least two decades as sentiment wanes in the once-booming market.

Developers sold 228 units last month, up from 221 in May, figures from the Urban Redevelopment Authority showed on Monday. That means fewer than 2,000 units were sold in the first six months of 2024, the least in available data going back to 2004, according to preliminary calculations by Bloomberg.

Initial home sales figures for the second quarter may be revised in finalised data released later this month.

SINGAPORE: A traffic police officer was on Tuesday (Jun 25) charged with dangerous driving that caused the death of a pedestrian who was crossing the road in the Tai Seng area last year.

Muhammad Firdaus Yusoff, 32, was on duty when he** **rode a traffic police motorcycle at a dangerous speed between 94.3kmh and 111kmh near the junction of Hougang Avenue 3 and Kim Chuan Drive at about 5.40pm on Jun 21, 2023.

The speed limit there is 50kmh.

SINGAPORE: An 88-year-old man was arrested on Wednesday (Jun 5) for the murder of a 74-year-old woman in a Petir Road flat, in Bukit Panjang.

The police said they were called to the scene at about 1am on Wednesday.

SINGAPORE: The interest rate for Central Provident Fund (CPF) Special, MediSave and Retirement accounts will rise to 4.08 per cent in the third quarter of 2024.

It dipped to 4.05 per cent in the previous quarter, the first decrease after three consecutive increases.

The higher interest rate is due to an increase in the 12-month average yield of 10-year Singapore Government Securities, said the CPF Board and Housing Board (HDB) in a joint news release on Wednesday (May 29).

The interest rate for these accounts is pegged to the average yield plus 1 per cent.

One person has been killed and several others injured on a Singapore Airlines flight from London that was hit by severe turbulence. 

The Singapore-bound Boeing 777-300ER was diverted to Bangkok and landed at 15:45 local (08:00 GMT).

Flight SQ 321 was carrying a total of 211 passengers and 18 crew, the airline said in a statement.

SINGAPORE: Fewer parking spots but a lot more electric vehicle (EV) chargers and bicycle parking lots will be found at the upcoming Punggol Digital District, touted to be Singapore’s first smart and sustainable business park.

The 50-hectare district – roughly the size of 70 football fields – will have 96 EV chargers in its first phase of opening. The plan is to ramp that up to 151 eventually, making it the location with the most EV chargers in Singapore, said national industrial estate developer JTC on Thursday (May 16).

To support environmentally friendly transport, the "car-lite" district in Punggol North will have 1,500 bicycle parking lots and facilities such as lockers and shower rooms.

Correspondingly, there will be fewer vehicle parking lots – at around 1,200, which is 50 per cent less than the requirements of a regular industrial estate, said JTC’s group director for new estates Nelson Liew.

Besides greener transport, the new business park will have infrastructure and technology to optimise land use and energy. This will also lower its carbon footprint, with a 35 per cent reduction in operational carbon emissions annually – equivalent to taking 4,000 cars off the road, said JTC.

SINGAPORE - A crane involved in works at a construction site in Sengkang toppled over and fell on a van. 

The accident took place on the afternoon of April 9 in Punggol Road, near the junction of Compassvale Street.

A woman who had been drinking her soy milk from Mr Bean and found a cockroach in it took to Facebook to share about the incident on Monday (18 March). In her post on Complaint Singapore, Facebook user Pamster Tan wrote that the drink had been purchased from the Mr Bean outlet at Queenstown MRT by her colleague.

She had started sipping the drink from 12pm, and later sucked up "something that is not a pearl and with a crunch". She discovered it was a cockroach after spitting it out.

The interest rate for Central Provident Fund (CPF) Special and MediSave Accounts (SMA), as well as Retirement Accounts (RA), will rise to 4.08 per cent per annum in the first quarter of 2024, said the CPF Board, Housing & Development Board (HDB) and Ministry of Health (MOH) in a joint news release on Wednesday (Dec 6).

The SMA interest rate rise, which is the third such increase in as many quarters, is "due to the increase in the 12-month average yield of 10-year Singapore Government Securities (10YSGS), which the SMA interest rate is pegged to".