Alteration & Addition
When an A&A beats a rebuild, what the approvals involve, and how long you are out of the house.
In this guide
33 min · 5 articles
/9 min
Rebuild or A&A? How to Decide
Choose an A&A when the existing structure will give you the plan you want and the house holds something worth keeping. Choose a rebuild when it will not. The test is structural, not aesthetic — and it is answered by a survey early on, before anyone draws anything.
/5 min
Adding a Lift to a Landed Home
A lift is the most requested addition on a resale landed property, and it is far cheaper to install during an A&A than afterwards. Where the house has a vertical void it can rise through, the job is mostly mechanical. Where it does not, cutting through the floors is structural work: a professional engineer designs it, BCA approves the structural plans before work starts, and the finished lift needs BCA's permit to operate.
/4 min
Before and After: What an A&A Can Actually Fix
An A&A can fix daylight, circulation, the relationship between the kitchen and the garden, and the absence of a lift. It cannot fix a floor-to-floor height that is too low, a structural grid in the wrong place, or a plot orientation that puts every principal room on the west. And it has a legal edge: URA treats a scheme that adds more than half the floor area, replaces more than half the external walls or changes more than half the structure as a reconstruction, not an A&A.
/7 min
Seven Signs Your Home Needs an A&A
Houses rarely fail suddenly. They accumulate small compromises — rooms nobody uses, damp that returns after every rain, circuits that trip, rooms unusable without air-conditioning, cracks that reopen, a kitchen sealed off from the family, and a steady bill for repairs. When several apply, a coordinated A&A is usually the more economical answer than another round of patching.
/8 min
Can You Extend a Landed Home in Singapore?
Usually yes — most landed houses have some capacity to extend, and many have more than their owners assume. How much is decided by the plot's setbacks, site coverage and envelope, by special area rules, and by whether the existing structure can carry the new load. A feasibility study answers it for your plot in a few weeks.
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