Racism in Singapore’s rental market: "No Indians, No PRCs"
Kurien Kalarickal came to Singapore 19 years ago for school and has been living here ever since. He is now a permanent resident.
While he's never had any trouble with school nor work, there was one hurdle he had trouble with - finding an apartment to rent.
"Sometimes when we turn up to view the place, they would say we're a bit concerned because you're Indian. They think that Indians cook a lot and don't clean the house or something," said Kalarickal, who now rents a room from an Indian landlord.
"They should question themselves and ask why they think this way? And make it more clear-cut in the contract. Saying no heavy cooking is better than no Indians," he said.
While Singapore hosts a multiracial society and sets aside a day every year to celebrate racial harmony, it seems to do little with the undercurrent of racism.
With approximately 5.64 million people, one-third of them are international students or workers. Local Chinese make up three-quarters of its native residents, while the rest are Malay, Indians and Eurasians - who sometimes classified under the "others" category.
There is an oversupply of apartments in the city-state with about 10,000 private homes likely to be completed by the end of 2018, reported local property portal PropertyGuru. The oversupply also means a drop in rental prices.
But even as the rental market undergoes a burgeoning supply, homeowners are still hesitant to lease out rooms to foreigners. Under rental listings, it is common to find requests like "No Indians” or "No PRCs."
This would mean that a lot of these apartments will remain empty. A real estate agent told CGTN that it is not uncommon for homeowners to make implicit request to not allow "tenants of certain ethnicities."
"One of the reasons why this happens is that landlords say they want to protect their assets, and they think certain ethnicity cook a lot and don't clean up or destroy properties. That might drive down the value of the apartment," he said, requesting anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.
The discrimination doesn't just hurt foreigners. Even local minorities are not spared.
Darius Cheung, the owner of a homegrown start-up called 99.co, said he had problems looking for an apartment to rent because his wife is a local Indian.
"It was a very painful and insulting process," said Cheung. He said that while the subtle profiling of certain races is understandable, it's also very unacceptable. He echoed sentiments of real estate agents, saying that owners would want to protect their homes.
"But they wrongly perceive that certain types of tenants will decrease the value of the assets. Because of that perception, they will continue to propagate discrimination, even though they're often not racist themselves," he said.
As a result of his experience, he founded a property portal app which allows homeowners to rent or sell their apartments. His team regularly scrolled through the app and removes users with discriminatory conditions such as "Chinese only" or "No Indians."
“We have a daughter who is three years old now, and it's very simple to think that I do not want my daughter to grow up in Singapore feeling like she would be discriminated because of her last name," he said.
