The latest estimates released by the Housing Development Board (HDB) show that HDB resale prices slowed to 0.9 per cent in the first quarter of the year, the smallest in the past ten quarters.

With the authorities set to launch more than 10,000 pre-sale HDB flats in the coming months, coupled with shorter waiting times for some flats, it may attract some potential buyers in the resale market to apply for pre-sale HDB flats instead, said Lee Sze Teck, senior director of research at property consultancy Huttons Asia.

Lam Tung-wing, principal executive officer of property consultancy ERA, agreed that price resistance could be the reason for the slowdown in resale price increases. He said that more buyers were showing more restraint when asked to bid higher prices, as higher bids meant they had to pay more of a cash premium.

OrangeEasy's head of property research and consultancy, Sun Yanqing, said that the majority of resales in the last quarter were of smaller flats, which may have contributed to the slowdown in resale prices. She also predicted that HDB resale prices would continue to rise, but at a much slower pace than the double-digit increases seen in the past two years, with estimates ranging from 5 to 8 per cent.