A condo ceiling leak is not the HDB goodwill scheme

Last updated 31 October 2026. Prices below are bands already printed on HomeySG. This page is not legal advice.

Condo leaks feel like HDB leaks and are run by a different set of rules. There is no Goodwill Repair Assistance letter, no HDB officer splitting a bill 50 percent to the Board, and no town council. There is a management corporation, a set of by-laws, and, if nobody will move, the Strata Titles Boards. The sentence people half-remember is real. Section 101(8) of the Building Maintenance and Strata Management Act says that in proceedings about an alleged defect in a lot or common property immediately above another lot, if there is dampness, moisture or water penetration on the ceiling below, or on the finish attached to that ceiling, the defect is presumed to be in the lot or common property above, unless proved otherwise. The Boards’ own page lists inter-floor leakage under section 101. Read the section. Do not treat a blog, including this one, as the Act.

A presumption in proceedings is not a key to the upstairs unit. It does not let you withhold maintenance fees. It does not tell the MCST to debit the upper owner tomorrow. It means that if a case is brought, the upper side has to bring evidence the defect is not theirs, and a bare “it cannot be us” has not impressed boards in published grounds of decision. Those decisions are fact-specific. We are not applying them to your stack. What you can do this week is give the manager something better than a raised voice: dated photos, a note of whether the stain follows rain, a shower, a flush or the aircon, and the two water-meter photographs if you suspect a supply pipe.

Sort common property from the lot before you accuse a neighbour. A roof terrace, an external wall, a common soil stack and a ledge drawn as common property are the MCST’s to repair, using the contractor they appoint, on the by-law timetable. Your bathroom membrane, your aircon drain that you never cleared, and your heater tray are not the MCST’s membrane. A stain on your ceiling that lines up with their bathroom is the classic inter-floor case. A stain that lines up with the corridor outside, or with a roof you do not own, is the classic common-property case. Mixing them in one angry email is how both get delayed. Say which one you think it is, and say you may be wrong.

Air-conditioning makes a mess of this. Condensate that overflows a choked drain in the upper lot is that lot’s water, and it can look exactly like a failed membrane. Condensate that drips from a common riser or a badly slung drain on common property is the MCST’s. Switch the upper aircon off for a day, if they will, and see if the drip pauses. Leave the bathroom unused the next day. The two results are the argument. A membrane quotation sold while the aircon test is still undone will waterproof a floor that was never the path. The heater and aircon guide on this site is the domestic version of that test.

By-laws will tell you the noisy-work days, whether a hack needs approval, and whether a deposit is held. Read them before a contractor promises “we can start Saturday”. A deposit is not a repair cost. Our minor-works page is about the small jobs an MCST schedules. It is not a leakage judgment. If the upper owner will not give access, the manager is the person who writes again. Section 101 is what exists if that still fails. The Boards also have a power about entry. Whether you should file is a decision for you and, if you want one, a lawyer. We will not draft the form.

Keep your own repairs modest until the path is agreed. A ceiling repaint at S$150 to S$400 after the leak has stopped is making-good. A full bathroom hack upstairs at S$4,000 to S$7,000 is the membrane job if the tests say so and the by-laws allow the hack. Doing it in the wrong bathroom, or before the MCST has looked at a common stack, spends that money on the wrong slab. Window-frame rain is still the window page. Do not let an inter-floor dispute swallow a mitre joint that drips only when the glass is wet.

Good records are dull. Photo, date, weather, whether anyone showered, whether the aircon was on, meter still or moving. Offer access to your own flat. A lower owner who will not be home for the inspection is as stuck as an upper owner who will not open the door. If water reaches a light, say so in the first line and isolate the circuit. The presumption does not require you to stand in a wet room and argue.

Homey Furnishing Pte. Ltd. (ACRA UEN 202018148K), 27 Mandai Estate, #06-10 Innovation Place, Singapore 729931, invoices permit-exempt leak checks, regrouting, silicone, and making-good after the water has stopped. V On Construction Pte. Ltd. (ACRA UEN 201611708H), on the HDB Directory of Renovation Contractors, invoices an HDB renovation permit when bathroom finishes are hacked or a new membrane is laid under new tiles. A concealed or new water-supply pipe is a PUB licensed plumber. Homey Furnishing is not that plumber and does not publish a waterproofing warranty term.

Curtains, blinds and roller shades are not part of this booking. Fabric window treatments are a different product, and these pages do not quote them.

The email to the MCST should be short enough to forward. Attach the log. Leave the law for a sentence and a link, not a lecture.

1. Photograph the ceiling and the room above it, if you can see the layout on a plan.
2. Run one cause per day: rain with bathrooms unused, then showers with no rain, then aircon only.
3. Do the meter pair if the stain grows when nobody is using water. PUB’s leaflet is the supply test. Waste and membranes do not move the meter.
4. Write to the MCST. Ask whether they treat the element as common property. Ask them to notify the upper lot.
5. Do not hack, do not set off a renovation deposit, and do not announce that section 101 means you have already won.

This is the condo column. The HDB and landed columns are here so a mixed development does not get the wrong scheme.

A plan snip with the stain marked. Three dated photos. The one-line test results. The meter photos if you took them. A sentence that you will give access. A question: is this common property or the lot above? That is enough for a manager to instruct a contractor or to write upstairs. A folder of every message since 2019, with no dates on the photos, is how a case sits in a queue.

If they send their contractor, ask what test that contractor will run. A look from the doorway is not a ponding test. You may still want your own meter photos. You do not need two membrane contractors hacking the same bathroom. One path at a time.

The Strata Titles Boards publish the types of orders, and inter-floor leakage is listed against section 101. Filing is a legal step with forms, fees and evidence. Nothing on HomeySG files it for you or estimates your chances. If you are already in that process, the useful thing a contractor can still do is a clear test: meter, one outlet, dye, pond, written down. Boards have looked at expert reports and at the absence of them. A WhatsApp voice note is not a report.

While that runs, keep the electrics dry and the shelter closed. SCDF does not allow a leak investigation to become a hacked household-shelter wall. A window that is a separate path should be resealed on its own invoice so the dispute does not delay a simple frame drip.

Write the path in the email. Change it if the test changes it. Do not marry the first theory.

Questions for the manager and for any contractor they send.

1. Do your by-laws treat this element as common property?
2. Have you notified the lot above, and what access are you asking for?
3. What test will your contractor run, and will they separate the aircon?
4. If a hack is proposed, what deposit and which day does the by-law allow?
5. Are you relying on section 101(8)? If so, say you have read it and you are not asking the manager to decide a case.
6. Which repair, if any, is a published HomeySG band, and which is quote on inspection?

Write to the MCST first. If access is refused and the stain continues, the Boards are the forum the Act provides. Get advice before you file. Do not use this article as the filing. Do not use a private hack as the filing either.

Electrics, falling concrete, and a shelter wall are the same stops as in an HDB flat. Isolate, keep clear, call 995 if you cannot make it safe, and do not open the shelter.

How you're charged

A leak or waterproofing job that already has a sentence on HomeySG uses that sentence. Nothing in this table is a fuel surcharge, and the handyman hour is not added on top of a band unless the written scope says so. A membrane, a balcony, a planter, a roof, an epoxy-grout system, or a listening survey with no matching row is quote on inspection.

Who is allowed to do the work

HDB’s renovation pages split a coat of silicone from a hacked bathroom. Replacing toilet wall and floor finishes is not allowed for 3 years from the completion date of the block, because a membrane sits on the screed. After that, a replacement uses pre-packed waterproofing screed, a membrane upturned at least 150mm at walls, kerbs and pipes, a UPVC floor-trap grating with a long collar, and a water test. Fines for unauthorised work are already written on the permit guide as up to S$5,000. Homey Furnishing does not sign the permit invoice.

• Regrout, a silicone zone, hollow-tile injection and a stain repaint after the water has stopped stay on the published rows. They do not replace a membrane.
• Opening the bathroom floor or wall finishes is V On Construction when the flat is HDB and the work needs a permit.
• PUB’s leak leaflet says it is an offence under the Public Utilities Act to engage an unlicensed worker for plumbing work. A concealed or new supply pipe is a licensed plumber. An exposed trap is a different visit.
• External walls of an HDB block are common property. The town council on the S&CC bill is the first report, not a private injector.
• SCDF does not allow hacking of household-shelter walls, floor slabs or ceiling slabs to chase a pipe. The leak is found another way.
• A window-frame leak is the window sealant page. Exterior rivets and stays stay with a BCA approved window contractor.
• Curtains, blinds and roller shades are not quoted here.

Ways to keep the bill smaller

• Photograph the stain, the wet room, and the water meter before anyone hacks. A hack that destroys the evidence is a second problem.
• Run one test at a time. Shower, flush, aircon and rain on the same afternoon make a useless log.
• If the joint is only mouldy silicone, the published zone is S$80 to S$150. That is not a membrane.
• If the ceiling is already dry and the source is fixed, the hairline repaint is S$150 to S$400. Paint on a live leak is how the stain returns.
• One cause per day for three days will do more for your email than a quotation for a membrane you have not proved.

WhatsApp the photos to +65 8561 0630.

Any private repair waits on the path. These bands are what exist if the work is yours and the photo matches. The Act does not set them.

Anything not in that table is quote on inspection.

WhatsApp the photos to +65 8561 0630. The reply uses a band already printed on HomeySG, or it says quote on inspection.

Official pages, not a legal opinion

Section 101(8) is summarised so you know it exists. The Act and the Boards’ page are the text. This is not legal advice and not an invitation to start proceedings.

• BMSMA section 101. Subsection (8) is the inter-floor presumption in proceedings.
• Strata Titles Boards, types of orders. Inter-floor leakage is listed under section 101.
• HDB goodwill letter. Cited so you do not apply it to a condo. It is an HDB scheme.
• PUB meter check. A moving dial is a supply leak, which changes who you call.
• SCDF shelter. Do not hack a shelter wall as part of a dispute.

• HDB flats use a different scheme
• MCST minor works
• By-laws and deposits
• Rule the aircon out
• Handyman price list