As at 5pm, the median application rate for first-time buyers of three-bedroom flats or above was 0.2 and the median application rate for second-time buyers was 2.4.

In this round of pre-buy HDB sales, HDB launched five projects in Queenstown Kallang Whampoa, Jurong West and Tengah, with more than half of them located in established towns.

Farrer Park Fields in Kallang Whampoa and Ulu Pandan Glades in Ulu Pandan, Queenstown are prime HDB flats.

In Farrer Park Fields, for example, four-bedroom units are priced from $439,000 after allowances.

Bona Industries chief executive officer Lim Eng Huat said, "Because prime locations have to wait for 10 years before they can be sold and then they have to be taken out of the sale, and then non-prime locations can be sold in five years."

Tengah has the most new units of any non-established municipality, with over 1,600 in total, and is the only development to offer five-bedroom units. The asking price for a five-bedroom unit starts from $356,000 after allowances.

Professor Ching Tien Fu, Chair of Real Estate at the National University of Singapore Business School, said, "The first point is that it is cheaper, the second is that the completion date is shorter, and recently because Anglo-Chinese School is also considering moving to this new town of Tengah, it could be a more attractive suburb."

The lowest priced four-bedroom units, for example, are sold in the non-established market town of Jurong West, costing about $228,000 after allowances. Analysts generally agree that this is an affordable range for the lower and middle income groups.

In addition, the Budget's new measures for first-time buyers, which will take effect from August, may also allow young families under the age of 40 to take a wait-and-see attitude and enter the market later in the year.

HDB said that the median waiting time for the launch of the pre-buy HDB project is about 4.4 years.

Under the Re-Home Ownership Scheme, eligible families can purchase three-bedroom HDB flats with shorter leases in this round of sales. The leases range from 45 to 65 years. Prior to this, they could only purchase two-bedroom flexible flats with shorter leases.