York Hill – The untold story of Singapore’s poorest neighbourhood

Added: 2026-05-12

[00:00:00]Hello everyone. Right now I'm at Jalan Kukup or York Hill. Anyway, today I want to share with you something in this estate. I believe a lot of you when you watch online online content, you will hear about whether it's a property agent talking about million dollars HDB flats, million dollars condominium and million dollars GCB. But somehow we just wonder whether the majority of Singaporeans can afford them.

[00:00:24]I mean there is definitely a segment of Singaporean, I will say the bottom 20% can't even afford their own HDB flats.

[00:00:33]And today content I want to talk about their life. Where are they staying? What kind of environment are they staying?

[00:00:40]And some of them very interestingly are staying at the heart of the city center, which is at York Hill.

[00:00:47]So let me share with you some brief history about this place. York Hill was the redevelopment of this area by HDB.

[00:00:54]That was after the post independent of Singapore. There was a lot of urban issues in the city area, sanitation issue, congestion, overcrowding. So after the post independent, the government of that day decided to relocate a lot of lower middle income Singaporeans to public flats. And that is why York Hill was selected by the government back then because it's one of the two hills in the city area. The other one being Pearl Hill. So York Hill was chosen and HDB has housed many Singaporeans in this location.

[00:01:31]Over here there is I think there's more than a dozen HDB flats comprised mainly rental flats as well as two rooms and three room HDB flats that is available for sale in the resale market. So having said that, let me bring you around.

[00:01:46]So right now I'm at the York Hill Hawker Center.

[00:01:49]So today is a Sunday. Many stalls are closed. As I mentioned earlier, this is one of the stalls that sell very affordable Muslim food. I mean I really have to respect them, you know. Okay.

[00:02:03]Okay. So there's $2.50 shop. I mean they have did a very big I will say it help to the community.

[00:02:12]Especially when a lot of the owners here or the tenants here are living on government payout. So here, let me share with you more about York Hill itself.

[00:02:23]I'm at the Hawker Center here. So you can see there's a very big open air car park.

[00:02:27]Okay.

[00:02:28]So there's a lot of rental flats here.

[00:02:30]There's also some shops, you know, some shop that sell the daily necessity.

[00:02:36]Okay.

[00:02:38]So if you're driving in, you have to drive towards the Outram area before entering the city. Turn left. So this is the area. Okay. All right here there's also a minimart that serve the community here.

[00:02:53]Okay.

[00:02:54]Let me walk up.

[00:02:57]Okay.

[00:03:00]And let me take the lift up to show you one of the typical blocks.

[00:03:07]So right now I'm at one of the block here. So you can see from afar right behind me is the River Valley area.

[00:03:15]Or I think the Zion Road area.

[00:03:18]So to this side is the rental flats ready. Okay. So you can see the York York Hill rental flats. Let me turn my camera around and let me share with you how does it look like inside one of the rental blocks. So you can see or so this is how it look like.

[00:03:38]Units by units all facing one another with a long narrow corridor.

[00:03:45]Okay. So you can see it's pretty dark.

[00:03:48]Usually they come without any bedrooms.

[00:03:53]They usually live in on a open concept kind of kitchen living as well as a living area. So this is the rubbish chute. There's two rubbish chutes.

[00:04:05]Rubbish chute is outside. This kind of practice has already been adopted by HDB long ago. So this is the view of the York Hill.

[00:04:12]Very nice views.

[00:04:14]You know.

[00:04:14]This is the Outram CTE.

[00:04:17]And this is the Sea Scare Hotel. And right over there I think there is some condominiums by CDL. So Perbank is over the other side. Okay, you can see Perbank.

[00:04:28]And so this is the overview of the estate. Okay.

[00:04:34]Okay. Right now I'm at the other side.

[00:04:36]Okay. There's a lot of uh slope here because it's on elevated ground. So you need to take the lift up and down to the other corner.

[00:04:47]So having said that it's not easy to be brought up in this area to be very frank.

[00:04:54]I I know where they come from. It's not easy. And I can only say that I don't although I don't have the numbers, I can only say that the odds of you know having a breakthrough in life is extremely challenging in this area.

[00:05:11]Because who you know, your neighbors the friends you mix with will have a impact. I mean impact to your life.

[00:05:23]So you can see I can see one child maybe studying at one of the boy there. I mean it's not easy to be you know brought up in this environment.

[00:05:34]For those that live in the three room flat rental flats or two room flat, you will know where I come from. I mean words cannot describe how they live and the kind of lifestyle they live and the challenges they face every day.

[00:05:48]That's why whenever I'm here, I feel very blessed that at least I was brought up in a three room flat in Bedok or not in the rental flat.

[00:05:57]Also but fortunately I will say that the government has a lot of subsidies, a lot of grants, a lot of support to help such family make it through in life.

[00:06:08]There's also if you're living in rental flats, there's also this uh I think it's called the first step grant or something like that provided by HDB to uplift families who live in rental flats to buy their own flat. I know of this scheme because one of my buyer who happened to buy one of my flats that I marketed last year in Toa Payoh she apparently come from a rental flat background. Very poor family.

[00:06:38]But because of this government step up scheme, they are able to own HDB flat of her own.

[00:06:43]So you can see there's even a playground here.

[00:06:46]I doubt any one of you has come here before. So I think there's one school here. I'm not sure what's the name of this secondary school.

[00:06:54]So okay.

[00:06:55]So let me share with you the communal facilities at the other side.

[00:07:00]So having said that, this is the multi-story car park. Okay. So for those that come to the CBD and want to save on car park, you can always come here. The parking rate is the standard HDB car park rate. It's not very expensive as compared to the city area. Or but obviously you need to walk a fair bit or walk very far in fact to the city area. So this is the communal area.

[00:07:26]You have a the playground here.

[00:07:29]Okay.

[00:07:30]You have a pavilion.

[00:07:31]You have some basketball court.

[00:07:34]And over this side I think they are mainly three room flats available for sale in the resale market. I think last done I think it's around 400,000 if I'm not wrong.

[00:07:44]I have leave the price uh uh inside this video. So you can see. So having said that, I have come to the end of my video. I just want to showcase the life of uh Singaporeans who are living in the bottom 20%. What kind of environment are they living in? What kind of houses are they living in?

[00:08:05]You know, I will say that this is the group of Singaporeans that their voices are almost unheard of.

[00:08:13]Nobody want to talk about them.

[00:08:15]And most of the time their voices not being heard.

[00:08:20]So that's why using this channel using my video as a medium at least I can showcase to fellow Singaporeans, you know how the poor in Singapore or put it very bluntly they are the bottom 20% of Singaporeans. I do not want to sugarcoat it with nice fancy full terms, but the hard truth is those people staying here are the bottom 20%.

[00:08:49]So the million dollar question, if you have watched some of my earliest video on SERS, I mentioned that this place there is a potential for SERS SERS or selective en bloc redevelopment scheme.

[00:09:04]But after Minister of National Development has mentioned early part of this year that the government will promote more VERS and they never say anything about SERS. So I do not want to say anything that is not true. But the government will go about VERS in 2030.

[00:09:21]They will come up with policy to rejuvenate housing estate in Singapore.

[00:09:26]So you can see all these are I think are rental flats.

[00:09:30]Okay. Block shelf.

[00:09:32]Okay.

[00:09:33]So there's even a playground here and some commercial shops.

[00:09:36]On [snorts] top is living quarters.

[00:09:39]So I think most of these shops are not really owned from HDB.

[00:09:45]So if you do want to run a business, you can always come here and approach HDB.

[00:09:50]But basically there's not many human traffic in this area.

[00:09:55]But it's good that I can at least can document it. You know, because you know, you never know one fine day, you know, um this place will be gazetted for sale or whatever, and the government decided to tear it down. At least I have this video to showcase to you how this housing estate look like. So, I hope that this video has served its purpose to share with fellow Singaporeans that there is a underclass in Singapore.

[00:10:21]There are Singaporeans who are living in the bottom 20 to 30%. I hope you enjoy it. Thank you for watching.