The Optional Component Scheme lets you buy flooring and sanitary fittings pre-installed by HDB at a fixed price folded into the flat price. One documented project paid S$4,900 for whole-flat flooring. Opting out means paying to remove what is there before paying to replace it.
What is included in OCS
Flooring and sanitary fittings, installed by the Housing & Development Board before the flat is handed over. Nothing beyond that.
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Flooring for the living and dining area
Tiles laid before handover, so the floor is finished on the day you collect keys.
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Flooring for the bedrooms
Usually vinyl or tile, depending on the project and the year it was launched.
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Sanitary fittings and the bathroom
Basin, taps, shower and the waterproofed bathroom floor, installed and tested.
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What is never included
Kitchen carpentry, wardrobes, lighting, painting and every finish beyond the floor.
The boundary matters more than the contents. Everything a renovation contractor quotes for sits outside this package, whichever way the decision went.
How much OCS costs for a BTO
The price is fixed by HDB and folded into the flat price rather than quoted separately. What is documented is what real projects paid.
| Item | Reported range |
|---|---|
| OCS flooring, whole flat | S$4,900 |
| Hacking two walls | S$1,350 |
| Making good after hacking | S$650 |
| Hacking one yard wall | S$450 |
| Making good, same project | S$300 |
Two documented 2025 projects. These are dated third-party figures, not our quote.
Sources youtube.com 2026-08-31youtube.com 2026-08-31
Read the ladder as two halves. The top row is what opting in bought; the four below it are what opting out cost somebody else.
Should you opt for OCS
Opt in if your design tolerates the standard floor. Opt out only if the design genuinely cannot, and price the removal before you commit.
Does this work need an HDB permit?
Sources HDB 2026-08-31HDB building works 2026-08-31
- Keeping it removes a whole trade from the critical path.
- Removing it adds hacking, disposal and making good.
- The bathroom is the half of the decision people underweight.
Nobody regrets keeping a floor they can live with. The regret runs the other way, once the removal invoice lands.
What opting out really costs, once making good is counted
Removal is never one line. It is hacking, then disposal, then repairing every surface the hacking damaged, and the third line is the one that is missing from most quotes.
- Two wall hackings: S$1,350.
- Making good those surfaces: about S$650.
- Total, on that project, near S$2,400.
A second, smaller project paid S$450 to hack one side of a service-yard wall and S$300 to make good. Different scale, same shape.
Both figures come from documented 2025 projects published with their numbers, read on the date shown in the sources block. Neither is our own quote.
What keeping OCS does to your renovation quote
It shortens the wet works phase and takes flooring out of the scope entirely. Both effects show up as time before they show up as money.
A shorter wet works phase means fewer days inside the tightest hours window, which is where programmes usually slip.
- No floor tiling means no tile cutting, which is restricted work.
- The bathroom is finished, so waterproofing is not re-opened.
- The site measure happens against a finished floor level.
Overlay instead of hacking: when it works
Overlay lays a new finish on top of the existing one rather than removing it. It avoids the hacking cost and the making-good cost together.
It raises the floor level slightly, which matters at thresholds and at door bottoms. That is the trade, and it is usually a small one.
- Vinyl and laminate overlay well.
- Thick tile over tile is rarely a good idea.
- Door clearances have to be checked before, not after.
Get a free quote
Tell us the flat type and when you collect keys. You get a scope discussion and an indicative cost band within one working day.
or email hello@btorenovation.sg
The three-year bathroom restriction and OCS
Newly completed flats carry a restriction on removing bathroom floor finishes, which protects the original waterproofing while defects would still surface.
Bathroom floor finishes in a new flat carry a three-year restriction
Overlay is normally the route within it. If you opted into OCS, this restriction is protecting a bathroom you already own and did not pay a renovation contractor to build.
Timing: when the decision has to be made
At booking, which is the part that surprises people. By the time a renovation is being planned, the OCS decision is years old.
Where the decision sits in the timeline
- At booking The Optional Component Scheme decision is made when the flat is booked, years before key collection.
- Before handover HDB installs what you selected. There is no window to change your mind here.
- At key collection You inherit whatever was decided, and the renovation is planned around it.
If you are already holding keys, this page is not a decision any more. It is an explanation of the floor you have and what it costs to change.
Who does the removal, and under what rules
A firm on the Directory of Renovation Contractors, working under an HDB renovation permit, inside the permitted hours for the class of work.
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01 PERMIT
Hacking always
needs oneAll demolition and hacking of walls, partial or complete, needs HDB’s prior written approval before anything starts.
hdb.gov.sg · read 2026-08-31
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02 HOURS
Mon to Fri
9am to 5pmRestricted works only. General works such as painting and screed run Monday to Saturday until 6pm.
hdb.gov.sg · read 2026-08-31
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03 DEADLINE
3 months for
a new blockFrom the date the permit is granted. Existing blocks get 1 month.
hdb.gov.sg · read 2026-08-31
Removing floor finishes is restricted renovation works. That single classification is what makes the opt-out decision a schedule decision as well as a cost one.
Permitted working hours: general works versus restricted works
Two classes, two windows. Removal sits in the tighter of the two, and everything downstream of it inherits the delay.
Permitted renovation hours, as HDB publishes them
Sources MyNiceHome by HDB 2026-08-31
General renovation works run Monday to Saturday, 9am to 6pm. Restricted renovation works run Monday to Friday, 9am to 5pm.
- Neither class runs on a Sunday or a public holiday.
- Restricted works also lose five named festival eves.
- Losing the Saturday is what compresses a removal phase.
Common OCS mistakes
Comparing the OCS price against a flooring quote alone. That comparison omits the removal side entirely, and the removal side is where the money is.
- Forgetting making good is a separate line.
- Assuming the bathroom can be redone immediately.
- Treating a Notice of Renovation as optional paperwork.
The last one is a compliance mistake rather than a cost one. The Housing and Development (Renovation Control) Rules 2006 attach the penalty to the flat owner as well as the firm.
The Optional Component Scheme against a renovation quote
People search for OCS HDB pricing expecting a like-for-like comparison against a contractor quote. The two numbers are not the same kind of number.
One is a fixed package price set before handover and folded into the flat price. The other is a competitive quote for work that has not happened yet, on a floor that may or may not need removing first.
- The package price does not move with your design.
- A quote does, and removal is the largest swing in it.
- Comparing them without the removal line compares two different jobs.
The honest comparison is package price against quote plus removal plus making good. Run that version and the answer changes for most flats, which is precisely why the removal line is so often left out of the framing.
Get a free quote
Tell us the flat type and when you collect keys. You get a scope discussion and an indicative cost band within one working day.
or email hello@btorenovation.sg
How the answer differs by flat type
A larger flat has more floor area, so both sides of the decision scale together. What does not scale is the bathroom, which is roughly the same job in every flat.
- 2-room and 3-room flats: the floor is small, the bathroom dominates.
- 4-room flats: the documented figures on this page came from this size band.
- 5-room flats: the largest floor area, and the largest removal bill.
That is why a single answer to whether the scheme is worth it does not exist. The floor area is the variable, and the bathroom restriction is the constant.
If a renovation loan is funding the work, the removal line has to be inside the amount borrowed rather than discovered afterwards. Lenders size against a schedule, and a schedule that omits hacking is a schedule that will be revised.
How every figure on this page is sourced and dated
Every number above comes from a named published project or an HDB page, with the date it was read. Nothing here is written from memory.
Where a published answer conflicts with the HDB source, the HDB source wins and the page says so. The same method runs across every guide on this site.
What we do not claim
We hold no accreditation, publish no rating and show no testimonial. The figures on this page belong to two households who published their own numbers, not to us.
The illustrations are generated and labelled. Nothing on this page is a photograph of a flat we worked on, because there is not yet one to photograph.
- No completed project is shown, because none is ours to show.
- No renovation loan is arranged or brokered here.
- BTO Renovation SG works across Singapore and publishes no reviews.
The documented figures on this page belong to the people who published them, and they are linked and dated so you can read the originals rather than trusting our summary of them.
- Every figure links to the source it came from.
- Every source carries the date it was read.
Where a figure could not be sourced, it is absent rather than estimated. That is why some questions on this page are answered with a range and others are not answered at all.
What happens after you send the form
Tell us which BTO project, which flat type, and whether you kept the Optional Component Scheme. We reply within one working day with a scope discussion and an indicative cost band.
- Which block, so the works window can be dated.
- Whether the floor stays, because it sets the sequence.
- When key collection is, or was.
Bring the renovation quotation you already hold if you have one. An itemised quote tells us more in a minute than a description does in ten.
Questions people ask
Who is allowed to renovate an HDB flat?
What are the permitted renovation working hours?
Are there days when noisy work is banned outright?
How long do I have once the permit is granted?
What is the penalty for breaking the renovation rules?
Can a structural wall be removed?
What notice do my neighbours get?
How do I check any of this myself?
What does this cost in practice?
Do you publish package prices?
Should I opt for OCS?
How much is ocs bto?
What is included in oCS?
What is the Optional Component Scheme?
Sources
Every figure above, with the page it came from and the date it was read.