Feng Shui Flaws Of Modern Day Apartments & Condominiums In Singapore

April 16, 2019

It has been a while! In case you’re wondering, I didn’t get into legal trouble for my previous post on feng shui masters and what goes on behind the scenes. Expressing my opinion based on facts will not land me in hot waters.

Too many things are going on in my life right now, and this has been the case for the past few years. Juggling two jobs can be quite challenging at times.

This post isn’t one of those technical feng shui articles, but rather, it’s going to be on what I’ve observed as a practitioner over the past few years. I’ve wanted to write about a phenomenon I’ve been noticing for quite some time now, but I kept getting distracted by other topics I’d like to talk about how our homes are designed these days, and I’m talking about the modern-day apartments in particular.

First Impressions Of Condominiums These Days

The bluntest way I can summarize what I wish to say in this post is this: I really, really hate how modern condominiums and apartments are designed. You are being screwed for your money and being screwed by feng shui.

What makes things worse is that every practitioner or ‘feng shui master’ out there tells you that Feng Shui Period 9 started in 2024 when it started in 2020.

Metaphysics and feng shui aside, I never understood why people wish to over-leverage and purchase such an expensive place, which is not only cramped but also, in my own words, “uninspiring”. Yes, fine, it’s still a space you call home and fits a family, but for the amount of money you spend, I would have expected these new apartments to make one go “wow” and feel good stepping into it. But no – you get a cramped area, a corridor which looks like a prison and a living room with no privacy (because you can see people in the opposite block). Worse, you must work to pay the mortgage for the rest of your life.

Which begs the question. Is your newly minted condominium truly a home? Or a burden?

It would have made more sense to use that money to do a really good renovation on a HDB apartment.

I’ve lost count of the number of feng shui audits I’ve conducted at newly launched condos. With all due respect to the developers, I’ve not been to a newly launched condo that impresses me both from the aesthetic front as a layman and from a Feng Shui perspective as a Chinese metaphysics practitioner. Fine, the aesthetics aren’t so bad, but a few thousand units in a development is ridiculous.

I absolutely hate modern-day apartments.

I’m sure everyone can tell that condominiums these days are built with a template, and you can’t help but feel that developers are just churning out new buildings for the sake of it to feed an irrational demand from the market. Here’s what I mean:

singapore_condo_feng_shui_template

singapore_condo_feng_shui_template2

I’m sure every Singaporean my age has heard of the saying or meme “same same but different”. That is the exact situation we have in the real estate market right now – everything is the same, yet different. It says a lot if the government has to step in to control the minimum size of a given unit because developers’ intent is clear – squeeze as many units in there as possible to get maximum returns on a plot of land. It is a business, after all, and people are feeding it despite these obvious issues.

Now, why am I talking about all this, and where does feng shui come into the picture?

What I’ve Noticed About Modern-Day Condominiums & Apartments

If you look at the examples I’ve put above, one thing that you can almost always say for certain is that the main door and master bedroom are always at the diagonal extreme opposite of each other. If the main door is at the bottom right, the master bedroom will be at the top left; if the main door is at the bottom left, the master bedroom will be at the top right.

You can name any newly developed condominium that will look like the above: Kingsford Waterbay, Affinity @ Serangoon, Lake Grande, Riverfront Residence and even Jadescape. You name it. It won’t differ too much. They look nice on the outside, but staying in them doesn’t give you the same level of satisfaction.

You will only find floor plans where the master bedroom is anywhere else but the extreme diagonal opposite from the older apartments from an era where houses weren’t mechanically manufactured or built. Even the facing directions are mostly the same because most stacks would face either North or South. In other words, non-templated layouts only exist for older apartments.

Do you know what the most disappointing thing is? Government/public housing apartments are being built like the above two floor plans.

I’m unfamiliar with what goes through the minds of developers as they build these projects, but as a practitioner, I have to say it’s quite a pity from a Feng Shui perspective. These templated designs will likely be why I will never purchase a ‘modern-design’ apartment. Let me explain.

If I’m spending that kind of money on the house, I would want the house to have perfect or near-perfect feng shui. I would not feel good knowing I’m staying in a less-than-ideal house, especially after witnessing first-hand how things can manifest. If you’re wondering what I mean by that, you’re welcome to go through my other feng shui posts to find out.

The sad reality is that you will never find an apartment with perfect or near-perfect feng shui from these modern-day condominiums and apartments because of how it is designed.

perfect_layout_feng_shui

The above description is for a house structure you can rarely find, but trust me, you will have an extremely tough time finding a house like this.

Near-perfect apartments exist, but only in older apartments with unique designs. You won’t find them being built anymore because we are now in the ‘templated-layout era’. If you take the above structure as shown in the Chinese text, the structure is not one whereby the main door and master bedroom are at opposite ends.

Feng Shui Implications For Modern-Day ‘Designs’ & Templates

Now, let’s assume that these newly developed condominiums’ floor plans and layouts are indeed always the same. The issue lies with the position of the main door and the master bedroom. Depending on the facing direction of your unit, you may end up with a few possibilities in terms of the feng shui structure. However, one thing remains constant: the main door and master bedroom will always have a clashing relationship with each other.

Please note that facing directions matters, and I’m not saying that all modern-day apartments are bad. I’m saying that modern-day templated designs and layouts make it impossible for the key Feng Shui areas to be in optimal positions. We always assess where the main door, master bedroom, and kitchen are, but modern-day apartments always see at least one key area out of position.

If you are fortunate enough, you will end up in a house with generally acceptable Feng Shui, but it will come with certain caveats, and it won’t be “perfect” or “near perfect” if I could describe a house that way. Take a house under 离门坎主 for example. This would be your 延年宅s where the description goes as such.

离门坎主:阴阳正配富贵局。名称延年宅,夫妇正配,水火既济之宅。福禄寿齐全,子孝孙贤,忠义贤良,儿孙满堂。久居克妻,犯心腹痛、目盲之疾。安震巽灶解之,全吉。

The above 离门坎主 structure happens commonly in houses where the main door and master bedroom are at diagonally extreme ends. This is a structure which I’ve encountered the most during my feng shui audits, the other being 艮门坤主 or 坤门艮主。 If you know what these Trigrams (卦) are, you will know these Trigrams have a “clash” relationship.

Progress for the tenants is still possible in the structures mentioned above, but the downside is that it is not good for the female of the house health-wise, and hence the 久居克妻 stated from the Chinese classics. Just look within your circle of friends, and I am sure you will be able to notice somewhat of a trend when it comes to health. For my foreign readers, 克妻 means the wife will be “harmed”.

On the flip side, if your ‘luck’ is in the gutters, you may end up in the worst possible layout under the 8 Mansions method, which holds the name 绝命宅 where 绝命 translates to “life coming to an end”. Such a house structure appears a lot because it’s the result of the main door and master bedroom are also at diagonally opposite ends. Not all clash relationships are the same – some are good, some are acceptable, whereas others are devastating. Let’s take the worst possible clash, for example:

震门兑主:龙争虎斗尤伤长。名称绝命宅,阴阳相克,丁财两亏,金木相克,患腰腿心腹肺疾病,初寡居乏嗣,孤苦伶仃。若为动宅,五层院高大为吉。

The whole sentence above practical says nothing positive. The last sentence, which mentions 动宅, is the only positive part, but it will no longer apply to any of us in this day and age as it refers to an architectural style in feudal China that no longer exists. If you ever end up in a 绝命宅, do not expect the house to bring you any form of progress. People with poor or low-quality BaZi charts usually end up in such houses, as I’ve explained repeatedly because our BaZi chart determines what kind of houses we end up with.

The Biggest Feng Shui Pity In My Opinion

When I hunted for my place, I wanted to make sure everything was perfect feng shui-wise, but I knew I wouldn’t be able to find it from one of these newly developed condominiums, so I didn’t waste any time there. I was not going to settle for anything less than perfect or near-perfect.

I find it a pity that people will no longer benefit from houses with an optimal layout and that there will always be some form of feng shui flaw in the house. I got a resale unit instead where the layout doesn’t follow the typical modern-day templated layout. I don’t know about you guys, but if you could apply feng shui, you would want your house to be perfect, wouldn’t you?

Many enthusiasts only pay attention to the Facing Direction of the house, which does matter, of course, but my opinion is that the layouts do matter too. My feng shui consultations and clients’ BaZi have always shown this to be the case.

If you happened to be someone who missed out on the launch of these new condominiums, don’t fret – it can be a good thing that you didn’t end up in one. I never felt they were impressive, to begin with. Sure, the showrooms and artist impressions look impressive, but we all know the end product would be entirely different.

I’m in a bit of a unique position to say such things because the nature of my job allows me to visit many houses. I’ve seen many of these projects go from the showroom phase to the completion phase and stepped foot in them too. I’m not a real estate agent trying to sell a house, so I remain objective about how I feel and suffer from no cognitive dissonance.

If the development is ugly and disappointing, and the feng shui is utter garbage, then, by all means, I will say so.

Feng Shui ‘Masters’ Partnering Up With Developers To Sell Units

I’ve noticed a trend of developers getting ‘practitioners’ down to pitch the development to the public. I’ve not been to one myself, so I’m not sure what is said during such events, but it’s safe to assume that these ‘practitioners’ are brought down to say how good these developments are feng shui-wise so that more deals can be closed. It’s just another one of those charades which I am very against.

The only thing I wish for my readers to know is that there will always be good units or stacks and bad ones in any development. You can never make a sweeping statement that every single unit within a development is good. That’s a bit of a long shot and extremely sloppy and irresponsible for any practitioner to say.

Like I always say: Apply some critical thinking and learn to make better decisions. Don’t just look at the surface of what’s going on.

The right thing to do would be to get a feng shui practitioner involved in the design process and not get him or her down after the development plan is finalized or when the construction is complete to say good things about it.

feng_shui_property_mortgage

We all know that’s not going to happen. No developer will make the process more complicated by getting a practitioner involved in the design process because why should they? Just build wherever and whatever – people will still buy.

How Do These Layouts Impact Us & How Does It Manifest?

This part has nothing to do with the technical aspects of Feng Shui per se, and I am just sharing my observations. Having visited and audited all these houses, I find myself asking what happens to the tenants who reside in these modern-day condominiums in the long run. Things are supposed to manifest according to what’s described in the books, but how exactly? This isn’t an issue that affects just a few families – this is happening on a macro level throughout the country because every single development looks the same. More and more people from my generation will move into these ‘flawed’ houses.

Looking at some of the possibilities regarding feng shui structure, you can’t help but wonder if most new homeowners will experience what’s written in the books. Take the above two examples I gave: Will all the females of the houses under 延年宅 start having health issues? Will the tenants in 绝命宅 start to stagnate and suffer? Time will tell.

I’ve audited a lot of houses under 延年宅 which is a structure where overall progress is possible, but the health of the female will dwindle, and a lot of times, I realized that the female tenant’s BaZi chart does paint the same story. It is supposed to. Quite often, they would have issues conceiving as well. I must write a blog post to address this for my female readers soon, as I’m getting many related cases.

What I’m trying to say is this: There’s a possible hypothesis that how houses are being built reflects societal trends as well. I do think about whether the way our houses are built is a premonition of what society as a whole will be like in the future. Not that I have any say in society’s governance or how things should be – I’m coming from the perspective of an observer:

  • Would a lot of females suffer from ill health in the future? Are they too overstretched to juggle work, family, and children simultaneously?
  • Would families truly progress in all aspects of their lives, which includes their careers, finances, health, and emotional well-being?

We don’t have control over feng shui or where we live as much as people think they do, which is why I always say you need good fortune to end up somewhere with feng shui. Such things are fated in a way. Where you stay reflects how your life was meant to unfold.

What I’m trying to say is this: I do think about whether the way our houses are built is a premonition of what society as a whole will be like in the future.

A phenomenon here in Singapore is that new development launches are swooped up and sold out within weeks. I never understood why. Is it because people don’t have a place to stay? Or is property seen as a quick way to riches? Let’s not forget that these people can only afford one house – it’s not that they currently reside somewhere and are investing in a second property. People are selling their homes to stay in these newly developed apartments, intending to flip them for a profit when the moment comes – assuming the moment even comes.

I’m all for investments and putting your money to work, but something about this trend of buying properties worries me. I’m sure everyone knows that the government has implemented cooling measures for the property market, and interest rates are also higher. It dashed people’s hopes of becoming wealthy by flipping their property.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but even if you sell your original unit for a profit, won’t you eventually spend that money on an equally, if not more expensive, house with an inflated price? I’m not done with the numbers, but the amount you earn doesn’t seem to make sense for all the trouble.

Also, good luck trying to sell your house when a recession hits in the next few years and let’s not forget about the people who will lose their jobs during that period.

Let’s try to be real here, but a condominium doesn’t always mean a better life, especially if you have to work like a dog to service the mortgage, and next thing you know – you’ve fallen ill and don’t even have the time and energy to enjoy.


I’ve also handled several cases whereby the client sold the house before looking for a place, and the whole process was so rushed that they had to settle for a house with much worse Feng Shui than their original unit. I would rather spend my time and resources finding other ways of growing my wealth.

Many people I know are now stuck with a much higher mortgage due to higher interest rates, with an asset (their house) depreciating in value. Their lives have become about chasing that next paycheque to service the mortgage and all the other expenses that come along with taking care of a family. I can’t help but find this a rather precarious situation because you are basically a slave to a system you unknowingly put yourself into. Life starts to feel like day-to-day attrition. You are so busy trying to survive that you can’t enjoy what life offers.

I don’t know about you, but I would rather live without worries; instead of lying to myself, I enjoy staying in a condominium when it’s draining me slowly.

Of course, this isn’t a phenomenon that only applies to people who bought the newly developed condominium. I’m also not saying that it’s the end of the world for people who moved into a newly developed condominium. What I described above could apply to anybody from any walk of life. I think the point I am trying to bring across and what I’m trying to explore is what this trend of new apartments means from a feng shui perspective and how things would manifest from there. It’s a very macro way of looking at feng shui, and it makes you question whether this is the beginning of a major trend where the females from the new generation of homeowners will start to have poorer health. People do start to struggle because of the extra financial burden.

It’s a very macro way of looking at Feng Shui, and it makes you question whether this is the beginning of a major trend where the females from the new generation of homeowners will start to have poorer health. People do start to struggle because of the extra financial burden.

Knowing metaphysics does allow me to look at situations and environments using a lens not available to most people. From what I’m seeing from both a feng shui and economics perspective, there are too many things that do not make sense to me right now. I find it hard to bring myself to say that houses these days will truly help us improve the quality of our lives.

Just so you know: The people who will get to build their houses from the ground up and tap into every positive aspect of feng shui would be – you guessed it – the people you are buying these new apartments from.

– Sean


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