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Our country sees an ever increasing amount of Singapore PR application submission by foreigners, and a big part of that comes from wealthy individuals and investors. It is also why many of these people try to migrate to SG through a GIP Singapore investor VISA.

Here are some reasons why our country is so popular to investors.

First of all, the tax laws have largely remained unchanged for many years. While some schemes and rebates within may fluctuate slightly year to year, generally speaking, it has remained relatively the same. It has been trying to keep tax rates competitive, and rebates attractive especially for corporations looking to incorporate in Singapore. Low taxes are definitely a plus point to any businessman with a brain!

Second of all, while there may be changes to the government and politicians sometimes during certain General Elections, almost all of them are in favour of keeping taxes as low as humanly possible. This means that regardless of election results, the tax segment of our local laws are almost always left unchanged.

Third of all, SG is a mix between the Western world and the Asian world. Unlike Hong Kong which is experiencing political issues now, Singapore is void of that. People who dislike big government or communistic governments like that of China and do not want anything to do with it would still very much prefer somewhere like Singapore, as it is largely capitalistic in nature. People who do not want to invest in more socialistic countries like European ones due to their high taxes will prefer our country too.

Next, Singapore’s citizens and permanent residents usually speak either English or Mandarin, or both. This means that both people from Western places like USA and Europe, and Asian places like China will be comfortable with living and working in our city-state.

SG is also largely seen as a neutral country when it comes to international politics by the world – which is probably a big part of the reason why even the Trump-Kim Summit was held here a few years ago. Being political neutral when it comes to international issues has led to relative stability, and this is a good thing if one wants to avoid unnecessary fluctuations to their businesses’ headquarters.

Singapore not only has a great tax system for corporations and individuals, it also has stable property prices. This attracts many wealthy individuals to also live here at the same time. While property prices may no longer appreciate like the wild days in the late 1990s and early to mid 2000s, it is stable in value. This is great if you want something stable – which is a good thing in times of economic uncertainty. In fact, so many foreigners constantly ask if they can buy property in Singapore to invest in or live in.

When you are trying to do your application to be a Singapore PR or permanent resident, you must have noticed that from the explanatory notes, one of the documents required is actually testimonials from previous employer which states the nature as well as the duration of your employment at that place, and the last drawn salary.

Submission of testimonials from your previous employer(s)

If you are wondering whether it is compulsory to submit the testimonials from your previous employer to get your PR application approved, the short answer is no. However, if you actually want a serious chance of having your profile being looked at by ICA seriously, then it is important to submit it. It is possible, but difficult to get your submission approved if you do not submit the required testimonials from previous employers, as ICA treats that as incomplete submission.

Additionally, Singapore is already on the trend of tightening immigration policies and increasing requirements partly due to growing nationalism sentiments. Therefore, you want to make sure that your submission is as complete as humanly possible. Being thorough, and even going above and beyond is important nowadays.

What if you cannot find your previous employer for the testimonials?

Some of you may have been working at a company where the employer moved overseas or due to some reason, you are unable to contact them. In such a case, please provide ICA with everything you know about them and your previous employment still. For instance, you want to provide your exact dates of employment, your last drawn salary as well as your reason(s) for leaving. Try to provide the contact(s) for them as well, so that ICA has the opportunity to be able to track them down in case they need to verify certain claims you have made.

What about past pay slips?

Most pay slips are not signed, and sometimes even provided to employees by email. Therefore, your normal one will do.

Any miscellaneous details required here?

You need to also include and complete the consent forms from the Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore (IRAS) so that ICA can access and verify your provided financial details. If you are self employed, then you will need to provide them with a valid business registration certificate and evidence as well as any occupational license if applicable.

If you have been shopping around for a company that advises on and helps for immigration related matters such as for Singapore permanent residence application, you will quickly notice there are many companies or websites which boast about their supposedly great pass rate percentage when it comes to getting permanent residency for their clients. However, other websites do not.

For instance, if you were a teacher, and taught only students at the top class in the top school in Singapore, having your students get good grades in national exams is no big deal. However, if you accepted a broad range of students, and made all of them great – then you are truly commendable.

Likewise, our immigration agency is one that focuses more on helping people. We accept a broad range of customers. In fact, many of our customers had complaints about other agencies not even wanting to listen to their case – even if they are willing to pay them, just because they do not take in any client they believe has a less than a 99.9% chance of PR approval, and hence falsely keeping their pass rate high. Thus far, we are one of the rare few who accept normal clients, as well as the difficult customers. When we say difficult, what we mean is with respect to their profile being approved for a permanent residence by ICA.

This does not mean that we will take you on if unfortunately, yours is a nearly impossible to pass case no matter what happens. For instance if you have been in prison for serious crimes before or are for example on work permit and clearly ineligible, we will not be able to accept.

However, for typical difficult cases, unlike our counterparts, we are able to accept. Of course, in extreme situations, our consultants will also make known to you that it will be a much harder and longer process, and that your probability of getting a PR is lower than others. Prices may vary according to that too.

Therefore, the next time before you get caught up in the wrong kind of statistics, the important point is to first verify how they calculate and update you about their so-called pass rate percentage, as some are legitimately good, while others are like crafty career politicians who play around with words!

Yes. PR can buy property in Singapore. In fact, one of the biggest reasons many foreigners go for a Singapore PR application is to become eligible to purchase certain types of property in Singapore, as well as save on property taxes.

Short answer to whether PR can buy property

Getting your permanent residence will already open up the eligibility for virtually every type of property in Singapore for you to purchase.

On the other hand, it is a different story for foreigners for the type they are allowed to purchase. They are only allowed to get very few types of properties in SG, and even then, there will be a hefty Additional Buyer Stamp Duty (ABSD) tax for the foreigners, which has only been increasing throughout the years at a more than proportionate rate compared to permanent residents.

Buying condo

With the exception of executive condominiums, all private condos are able to be purchased with zero restrictions.

Private condos

When it comes to private condos, there are no restrictions as long as you have the necessary cash to buy it, or the necessary profile required to qualify for a loan to buy it. Additionally, there is no limit to the number of these units that you can snap up. The amount of ABSD taxes applicable to you will be in between that of citizens and foreigners.

Executive condominiums

An executive condo looks exactly the same as a private one. The only difference is that it is partially subsidized by the government, for citizens.

Only Singaporeans are able to get them first hand. A permanent resident can buy it after 5 years from the completion of its development. Foreigners are able to buy it after 10 years from date of completion.

Can PR buy landed property?

What if you are a true baller and even intending to get a local GIP Singapore investment VISA? Perhaps you want something more prestigious and to separate yourself from the pack by getting a landed property or home.

You are only eligible to get landed properties on the mainland with manual approval from the Singapore Land Authority (SLA), and only after you have been one for at least 5 years.

Foreigners are not allowed to buy any kind of landed houses on mainland.

Sentosa Cove is the unique exception

Ever wondered why many foreign billionaires buy houses on Sentosa Cove? This is because there are absolutely no restrictions on the buyers when it comes to landed property on Sentosa Cove. That is the only known place right now which has no restrictions for the buyer’s profile.

Can PR buy HDB flat?

Both and only citizens and PRs are allowed to purchase HDB units. However, only citizens are allowed to buy HDB units at the subsidized rates. PRs are only eligible to buy them at the Open Market rate, which can be roughly $100,000 to $250,000 more expensive than the subsidized rates.

When it comes to approvals for new Singapore PR applications, there were questions raised in Parliament just earlier on this week. The exact quote can be found on the Ministry of Home Affairs site.

But in short, what happened was that the government was asked about whether there would be any changes to the current racial percentages which exists in Singapore, and whether changes, or the absence of which would potentially affect any sense of belonging to the country or minority rights issues. To this question, the government has officially announced that as Singapore invites and welcomes new migrants, the country will still accept new people in accordance to the current racial distribution in the country.

This is in conjunction with what was already previously discussed by ICA and the local government, that we are still expected to see stable growth rate in new migrants. Because with stable flow of new Singaporean citizen or permanent resident applications, the racial balance of our country can potentially quite change quite drastically. For instance, at the current moment, the general location population is made up of:

• 76 percent Chinese
•  15 percent Malay
• 7.5 percent Indian
• 1.5 percent others

To illustrate very simply, if lots of new migrants come in and an overwhelming majority belongs perhaps under ethnic Indian group, they can easily distort the current population proportions in SG after only several years. This is because we have a small population for a country, and small changes over just a few years can drastically distort entire population landscapes in the city.

Do we believe whether this will affect any body who is trying to apply for a citizenship or a permanent residence? Our answer is no. This is because such practices have been the same for years and decades – so there is no difference to the past situations anyway. What happened in the Parliament is just clarification of what was already going on.

Do we believe that this is beneficial or negative for our society? We prefer to steer clear of politics, as that is not our business. However, we believe that the past for our country has been smooth on the whole, so keeping it the same probably will not affect much to the current society anyway. So if you already like how it is like in our city, then you will still likely continue to like it in the future and vice versa.

Many governments and people around the world are having increasing nationalism sentiments, exacerbated by politics in the USA, and then followed by Brexit. We are not here to discuss the politics of it, as we strongly do not believe if there is a right or wrong answer. However, what we do believe is that it will affect migrations around the world, including Singapore!

To add onto that, COVID related lockdowns (thankfully Singapore has recovered quickly, at least locally) have led people to realize the sheer importance of a country putting its local businesses and own people first, and independence. These growing nationalism sentiments are also growing in Singapore.

The way we view it, this is not a trend which is going away anytime soon, and in fact, will only get stronger and stronger across the world. Because the locals are the ones who put the government in place, the politicians will have to listen to these sentiments, or it will be a matter of time before they get removed forcibly from office.

We believe the following are ways in which immigration related issues will be impacted in Singapore:

• The barriers to entry – such as requirements when it comes to getting a permanent residency will get increasingly tougher as the years go by, so as to optimize the maximum benefits for the existing citizens and residents of the country.
• Approval times required for a PR application will probably get longer. If you have not yet already applied, here is a rough time estimate for how long the process can take. It is already quite long, so hurry now and get it done and over with fast if you eventually are going to go for it anyway.
• We believe that in the middle term, even the requirements required for things such as getting a long term visit pass for parents of SPR is going to get tougher.
• The benefits that those who do get their status approved and become an official permanent resident will greatly increase and improve. This means that we believe while the hurdles to get your residence will be much tougher in the coming years, the benefits that will come if you succeed will be much greater as well!

Even though Singapore has also been affected by COVID in 2020, the country as a whole has since been reopening steadily since phase 2 of late June 2020, and has seen extremely well controlled, detected cases of COVID, and as a result of that, if you walked about Singapore now, you will notice that it is almost 100% back to business!

In fact, just a few days ago, phase 3 preparations were announced and we are expecting to enter it extremely soon. This is good news because – detected infection rates are very low in Singapore, and death rates are even lower than that! Additionally, people can get on with their lives and businesses, and thus saving as many jobs as possible.

Perhaps, it is just nightclub entertainment and some tourism related industries which are still hit heavily. Outside of that, with such a few good recovery, that is why Singapore continues to attract lots of immigration from people all around the world and this phenomenon is still happening this year too!

That is actually one of the reasons why Singapore has to always reject far more people trying to become a permanent resident here, as there is overwhelming demand for migration here and applying for PR. In fact, despite the pandemic in 2020, our country has been doing well on the whole ever since late June, and is back to normal except for approximately 1 to 2% of local activities (of course, and travelling). Would you not love to live in such a country like ours which is safe, and with reasonable and quick recoveries, unlike certain other countries such as some in Europe where draconian, socialist governments are shutting everyone down and everyone up?

If you got your prior PR application rejected, here is some advice on how to write appeal letter to ICA.

One of the biggest concerns by people is their elderly parents, whom they often picture as being vulnerable in their existing homes, far away from them. However, you need not worry! Get your own PR status approved FIRST. This is because you can apply for long term visit pass for parents of SPR. So rest assured, and simply apply for yourself first!

There are heavy debates recently by nearly all local political parties with respect to the targeted population, as it is one of the key points which is of importance to the current citizens and permanent residents. If you are currently still a foreigner and are going for a Singapore PR application within the next few months or years, you may be worried if such discussions may affect your probability of success.

We had briefly touched on this topic before. However, we will discuss it more in depth here.

Many years ago in 2013 via the controversial Population White Paper, Singapore wanted to increase the head count in people living in it to 6.9 million, by bringing in 30,000 new permanent residents each year. Even more recently, there has been rumours of wanting to potentially increase it to 10 million. There has been allegations that is actually planned out, yet there are also people who denied that idea.

Regardless, in the latest upcoming 2020 Elections, there has been more contesting parties with credible reputations and more and this has been putting a lot of heat on the government. As a result, it is unlikely that such a matter with respect to the targeted population will be swept under the rug any longer.

The current targeted rate for new PR will be 30,000 a year. Let us take both extreme examples so that we are prepared either way it goes. We believe that either way it goes, there will be heavy scrutiny on this topic by all parties.

Example 1: There are indeed plans to increase the local head count to 10 million by 2030

If the local population keeps increasing till that number steadily over time via mainly immigrants, it will likely drive up the prices of real estate in Singapore to even higher prices, even though it is already high. This can lead to potential discontentment among the growing numbers of those who cannot afford a place of their own here – or get a loan and struggle to pay it off.

Therefore, it is likely that regardless of whatever happens in the upcoming General Elections 2020, there will be further scrutiny on this issue, and even if the target is kept at, the criteria may be raised, so as to justify the reason behind this goal to the people.

Example 2: There are no plans to do so, and it will be kept at an absolute maximum of 6.9 million or less by 2030

This means that at least between now and 2030, the process and approvals will not get any easier than it is right now. The difficulty may remain the same, or increase over time simply due to the eventual slow down in acceptance of new PR applications.

As you can tell, we strongly believe that as a nation matures, the criteria will only get tougher over time. So keep your documents in order, and have a stellar record to have the highest probability of getting approved when you do apply!

Getting a long term visit pass LTVP from Immigrations Checkpoints Authority (ICA) for your elderly parents is possible if you are already have permanent residence.

Who else can you get LTVP for?

In fact, the long term visit pass LTVP is also open for S pass and Employment Pass holders who are interested in it for their family members, and is not just available for the parents. Some of the family members who can get the long term visit pass LTVP will be:

• Your spouse
• Your children
• Parents in law
• Step children

When you get this Long Term Visit Pass LTVP as a SPR for your parents, your parents will be able to have up to 2 years unlimited stay in Singapore most of the time. The only caveat is that LTVP application does not allow for your parents to work in Singapore, it is merely like a very long term social pass. This is not an issue for most people and their parents as most who get the Long Term Visit Pass LTVP for their parents are simply doing so to let their parents be able to live with their child (you) locally here in Singapore too.

However, in the unlikely event your parents wish to move over to pick up jobs, then yes they still can, if they have the relevant work visas.

Time it takes to get LTVP pass

When it comes to the application process for the LTVP, it can vary between a short 7 working days while there are actually also cases where people and their parents needed to wait up till around 6 weeks before they got it successfully. As you can possibly tell, there is quite a large range of time.

To check on this status, it is quite easy and either the sponsor (you) or your parent can check on their respective assigned Foreign Identification Number (FIN).