ABSTRACT
In Singapore, land release to the private sector is carefully controlled and private property developers are closely regulated by the state. Inequalities in housing will reflect inequalities elsewhere especially if the operation of the property market facilitates speculation. There are some important additional inequalities emerging, particularly related to multiple property ownership. Some people invested in property at the right time and have become wealthy as a result. Others invested at the wrong time and are impoverished. Individual property ownership encouraged through privatization and home-ownership policies has begun also to be attached to traditional welfare models, especially in Europe. The East Asian welfare states in their mature or later stages have acquired new distinctive characteristics associated with property ownership and inequalities in relation to the property market. The new property owning welfare states in East Asia and Europe have housing and home-ownership at their core.
