On average, Singaporean senior citizens who took part in the Lease Buyback Scheme (LBS) earned S$177,000 per household, including the LBS cash bonus.

The Ministry of National Development gave the figure in a written answer in Parliament on Monday (Oct. 7), in response to MP Foo Mee Har, who asked how the LBS has helped retirement adequacy.

According to HDB, here's how it works:

• You can sell part of your flat’s lease to HDB and choose to retain the length of lease based on the age of the youngest owner.
• The proceeds from selling part of your flat’s lease will be used to top up your CPF Retirement Account (RA).
• You can then use your CPF RA savings to join CPF LIFE, which will provide you with a monthly income for life.

The scheme was updated in 2015 to cover four-room flats, and give seniors more options in the length of their lease they could retain.

Seniors with more funds in their retirement accounts usually got a higher proportion of their proceeds in cash from the scheme.

According to MND, "most" seniors who made use of the LBS could count on a "lifelong income stream" of $$1,000 per month from their CPF accounts per household, on top of their cash bonus.

Not too bad.

Top image from HDB's Facebook page.