The RES Topics Candidates Ask About Most: What 56,000+ Community Messages Reveal

Ask five RES candidates what to focus on, and you may get five different answers.

HDB. ABSD. Land law. Calculations. Whatever came out in the last sitting. Whatever someone's trainer insists is very important.

The problem is that most of this advice is anecdotal.

So we tried something different.

We analysed 56,417 cleaned textual messages from a public Singapore RES community, covering discussions from October 2021 to September 2026.

Not to predict the next exam. Not to declare which topics are “hardest”. And definitely not to reverse-engineer some mythical examiner’s favourite question.

We wanted to answer a simpler question:

What do RES candidates actually keep asking about?

The answer is more interesting than a top-10 list.

HDB dominates the broad conversation, which probably surprises nobody. But once we drill down to individual concepts, ABSD and CPF stand out. Old-school Paper 1 topics like easements, co-ownership and future interests refuse to disappear either.

More importantly, the questions tend to fall into three patterns:

1. A fact changes the rule. Think citizenship for ABSD or first-timer status for HDB grants.

2. Two similar concepts need to be separated. Think joint tenancy versus tenancy in common, or remainder versus reversion.

3. Several rules apply in sequence. Think OTP, contract formation, stamp duty and caveats.

That is ultimately more useful for revision than knowing that a keyword appeared 699 times.

At a glance

The 12 most recurrent specific concepts we classified

Ranked by independent discussion episodes, not raw message count. More discussion does not mean a topic is harder, more frequently examined, or more commonly answered incorrectly.

65,107 records went in. 56,417 messages came out.

The original Telegram export contained 65,107 raw records.

Not all of those were candidate messages. Telegram records things such as members joining the group and other system events alongside ordinary conversation.

We removed obvious commercial or promotional posts and near-identical reposts from the same sender.

The dataset is also not evenly distributed across five years. Most of the community activity sits in 2022 to 2024: 25,299 ordinary messages came from 2022 alone, compared with 2,571 in 2025 and 1,128 in 2026 through 11 September. We therefore use recurrence, participants and persistence alongside raw volume rather than treating each calendar year as equally represented.

What we didn't do was throw away every short message.

That would be a terrible way to analyse Telegram.

“Why?”

“Joint tenancy?”

“What if SPR?”

Those messages look useless in isolation. In a reply chain, they may be the whole point.

The export preserves 21,911 explicit reply relationships, so much of that conversational context can be reconstructed.

There is one meaningful blind spot: images.

Telegram recorded thousands of image posts without including the underlying files in this particular export. Where an image had no useful accompanying text, we excluded it rather than pretending we knew what was inside.

So when we say 56,417 messages, we mean cleaned, analysable textual discussion.

Not 56,417 guesses about screenshots we couldn't see.

A message is not the same thing as a discussion

Suppose someone asks an ABSD question and 30 people spend the next hour discussing it.

That's 31 messages.

Now suppose 20 candidates independently ask about remainder versus reversion over four years, and each gets one reply.

That's 40 messages.

A basic keyword count would tell you the two topics generated similar amounts of activity.

They clearly didn't generate the same kind of activity.

So we measured several things:

• Messages, for overall volume.

• Independent discussion episodes, for recurrence.

• Distinct participants, for breadth.

• Active months and years, for persistence.

For the main analysis, a new temporal discussion episode begins after a 30-minute break, while Telegram's explicit reply structure is retained where available.

And because 30 minutes is obviously a judgement call, we tested 15- and 60-minute definitions too.

The ranking barely moved. Rank correlations across the alternatives ranged from roughly 0.986 to 0.995.

Removing same-sender near-identical reposts also made almost no difference to the ordering.

A note on the current and 2027 syllabuses

The discussions analysed here span the syllabus used for the current RES examination, which remains in force for the October/November 2026 sitting. CEA's revised syllabus takes effect from 1 January 2027.1

That means this analysis is useful to candidates sitting the current syllabus and to candidates preparing for 2027. Many of the recurring concepts below, including ABSD, CPF, HDB transactions, co-ownership, future interests and property finance, remain relevant under the revised syllabus.

Where the 2027 syllabus introduces or reorganises topics, historical counts should not be compared directly with subjects that have been examined and discussed for years. Low historical discussion does not mean a new 2027 topic is unimportant.

What RES candidates discussed most

At the broadest level, HDB generated the most recurrent discussion by a wide margin.

The table below is ranked by independent discussion episodes, our primary recurrence measure.

That is not particularly shocking.

HDB alone contains enough eligibility conditions, grants, ownership rules, financing issues and transaction procedures to keep a Telegram group busy indefinitely.

What is more interesting is what happens when we stop counting giant umbrellas like “HDB” and look at specific concepts.

The concepts that keep coming back

Among the specific concepts classified in our analysis, ABSD generated the largest number of independent discussion episodes, with CPF/property use not far behind. The full ranked table appears near the top of this article so readers can see the answer before the methodology and deeper analysis.

There's a good example here of why episode counts matter.

Easements and covenants generated 365 messages, slightly more than HDB grants.

But grants appeared across 168 separate discussions, compared with 148 for easements and covenants.

Neither number is “better”.

One measures how much people talked.

The other measures how often the topic came back.

ABSD: the question is often not “what is the rate?”

ABSD produced 699 classified messages, 311 independent discussion episodes and 285 participants, with activity across all six calendar years represented in the dataset.

These categories can overlap.

And that overlap is the point.

IRAS says ABSD liability depends on factors including buyer type, buyer profile and residency, the number of residential properties owned, and trust-related ownership structures.2

So the useful revision question is not:

“What's the ABSD rate?”

It is:

“Which facts tell me which ABSD rule and rate apply?”

ABSD decision sequence

1. What is being acquired?

2. Who is acquiring it?

3. What is the buyer's relevant citizenship or residency profile?

4. How many residential properties count?

5. Is a trust involved?

6. Is there a potentially relevant remission?

7. What is the relevant acquisition date?

Only then does the rate table become useful.

And because rates and rules change, a Telegram answer from 2022 may reveal a recurring question without giving you a current answer.

CPF and property finance: four limits, four different questions

CPF/property use was almost as recurrent as ABSD: 531 messages, 292 independent episodes and 252 participants.

Again, this is mostly not a “What does CPF stand for?” problem.

It's an interaction problem.

CPF Board says how much OA savings can be used for a property purchase depends on factors including the property's remaining lease, property type, loan type and whether it is a first or subsequent property.3

The community contains a direct example of why this matters: a candidate asks whether LTV is the same percentage as MSR or TDSR.

That's what happens when three percentages are learned before their functions are understood.

HDB grants: who qualifies matters more than memorising the grant names

HDB grants produced 356 messages, 168 independent episodes and 166 participants.

The recurring question is not merely:

“What grants exist?”

It's:

“Which grant does this particular applicant get?”

HDB's current framework likewise separates eligibility according to matters such as transaction type, household composition, income, citizenship, property ownership and previous housing subsidies.4

Grant decision sequence

new or resale → household type → citizenship → first/second-timer status → income → housing history → proximity

The practical topics have something in common

ABSD, CPF and HDB grants look like different syllabus areas.

But the community questions share the same basic structure:

one factual variable changes the answer.

Revision framework 1

Find the decision variable.

Ask: Which fact in this scenario causes me to move from one rule to another?

Land law refuses to go away

You might expect practical HDB and tax questions to overwhelm abstract land-law discussion.

They don't.

Easements and covenants: draw the land before memorising the definition

Easements and covenants generated 365 messages across 148 independent episodes.

The most useful starting point is simple:

Which land benefits?

Which land is burdened?

Dominant tenement

Enjoys the benefit of the easement or right.

Servient tenement

Bears the burden of that easement or right.

For registered easements, the Land Titles Act requires the instrument to identify the nature of the easement, the burdened land and the dominant tenement.5

For restrictive covenants, the Act similarly distinguishes land receiving the benefit from land bearing the restriction.6

Before trying to remember a dozen examples, draw two boxes.

A lot of the jargon gets easier once the relationship is visible.

Joint tenancy versus tenancy in common: death is not the first question

Co-ownership produced 209 messages across 101 independent episodes.

The recurring discussion clustered around survivorship, shares, wills and inheritance, severance and the four unities.

Chan Lung Kien v Chan Shwe Ching [2017] SGHC 136 describes joint tenancy as ownership in which the joint tenants together own the whole property, without each holding a distinct share in the same sense as tenants in common. Its hallmark is the right of survivorship.7

By contrast, tenants in common hold distinct undivided shares.

Co-ownership sequence

1. Joint tenancy or tenancy in common?

2. If TIC, what are the shares?

3. If JT, was it severed?

4. What event occurred?

5. Only then ask what happens to the affected interest.

Don't jump directly from “death” to “will”.

First identify the ownership structure.

Remainder versus reversion: ask where the future interest went

Future interests produced 164 classified messages across 69 independent episodes.

Remainder and reversion were directly discussed together in 17 separate episodes.

The problem is that both concern an interest that becomes possessory later.

So “it happens in the future” doesn't distinguish them.

The better question is:

Where did the future interest go?

Reversion

A grants a limited estate to B. The later interest remains with A when B's estate ends.

Remainder

A grants a limited estate to B, with the later interest granted onward to C.

The simple working distinction is:

Retained by the transferor: reversion.

Granted onward: remainder.

The Land Titles Act expressly contemplates life estates and estates in remainder following the determination of a life estate.8

Revision framework 2

Reconstruct the legal relationship.

Ask: Who owns what? Who benefits? Who is burdened? Who holds the present interest? Who holds what comes afterwards?

OTP: the stages matter

Options to Purchase generated 237 messages, 149 independent episodes and 140 participants.

This topic is easy to oversimplify.

A common mental sequence is:

OTP → exercise → equitable interest → caveat

But Singapore law is more nuanced.

An option over land can itself give the option holder a contingent equitable interest, before exercise. In Ong Chay Tong & Sons (Pte) Ltd v Ong Hoo Eng [2008] SGCA 42, the Court of Appeal recognised the settled proposition that a simple option constitutes an equitable interest sufficient to support a caveat.9

Proper exercise ordinarily moves the parties into the contemplated sale-and-purchase contract, subject to the actual option terms.

The Court of Appeal describes this two-contract structure in Li Jialin and another v Wingcrown Investment Pte Ltd [2024] SGCA 48: the option exists first, and the sale-and-purchase contract ordinarily arises when that option is exercised according to its terms.12

A caveat is another thing again.

It protects a claimed interest. It does not create that interest.

1. OTP granted

The option holder may already have a contingent equitable interest.

2. OTP properly exercised

Ordinarily forms the contemplated sale-and-purchase contract, subject to the option terms.

3. Completion

Contractual completion occurs according to the transaction terms.

4. Registration

The relevant dealing is registered in the land-registration system.

Caveat: a caveat protects a claimed interest. It does not create that interest. Depending on the transaction, option exercise may also be relevant to BSD or ABSD acquisition-date analysis.

Section 115 of the Land Titles Act allows a person claiming an interest in land to lodge a caveat and, for purchasers, expressly contemplates the date of the contract or option exercise.10

IRAS likewise uses transaction dates such as acceptance of an OTP when determining acquisition or disposal timing for stamp-duty purposes, depending on the specific duty and transaction structure.11

Revision framework 3

Build the timeline.

Ask: What exists before this event? What happens at this event? What changes afterwards?

Some concepts need to be combined. Others need to be kept apart.

This may be the most useful finding in the whole analysis.

A useful RES shortcut

If the concepts combine: ask, “What separate part of the transaction does each rule govern?”

If the concepts need to be distinguished: ask, “What fact or legal relationship separates one from the other?”

Concepts candidates need to combine

These are not automatically “confusion pairs”.

ABSD and BSD can both legitimately apply to one acquisition. CPF and grants can both affect how a purchase is funded. OTP and caveat can belong to different stages of the same transaction.

Concepts candidates need to distinguish

Some questions keep coming back for years

The community wasn't equally active throughout the period.

So raw year-on-year totals need to be treated carefully.

Persistence is more useful.

ABSD appeared across all six calendar years represented.

So did CPF/property use.

Joint tenancy and tenancy in common did too.

Future interests also resurfaced across all six years.

Other areas including HDB grants, BSD, OTP, easements and covenants, MOP, SSD, LTV, TDSR/MSR and mortgage law appeared across at least five years.

That doesn't mean the rules stayed identical.

What persisted was the shape of the question.

What 56,417 messages cannot tell us

A dataset this large can create a false sense that anything can be measured. It cannot. More discussion does not mean a topic is harder, more frequently examined or more commonly answered incorrectly. This is a community-discussion dataset, not an examination-paper or candidate-performance dataset.

Someone asking for clarification is not the same as someone answering an exam question incorrectly. A long thread can also contain several candidates who understand the rule perfectly well and are explaining it to others.

The Telegram community is our source for candidate behaviour, not legal authority. Where this article explains a substantive rule, we separately check current Singapore legislation, government guidance or case law. That matters especially in a dataset covering several years, because an old community answer can be sensible and confidently written while still being out of date today.

Finally, this dataset represents one large public Singapore RES community, not every RES candidate. Candidates who join and participate in Telegram groups may behave differently from those who study independently or use other communities.

So what should you actually do with this?

1. For rule-heavy topics, find the decision variable

Good examples: ABSD, CPF, HDB grants, financing and stamp duties.

Ask:

Which fact changes the applicable rule?

2. For concept-heavy topics, draw the relationship

Good examples: easements, restrictive covenants, co-ownership and future interests.

Ask:

Who owns what? Who benefits? Who is burdened? Who holds the present interest? Who holds what comes afterwards?

3. For transaction topics, build the timeline

Good examples: OTP, caveats, stamp-duty timing, completion and registration.

Ask:

What event happened, and what did it trigger?

What everyone else asks is not necessarily what you need to practise

This is the final limitation of any article called “the topics candidates ask about most”.

It tells you what happened across a community.

It does not know what is happening inside your own answer sheet.

You may be excellent at ABSD.

You may never confuse joint tenancy with tenancy in common.

And you may repeatedly get a comparatively obscure topic wrong.

What other candidates ask about isn't necessarily what you need to practise.

Community data can show which questions repeatedly arise across thousands of discussions. It cannot tell you where your own gaps are.

The free ConfirmPass diagnostic uses 20 questions and asks how confident you were in each answer, helping separate what you know from what you got right by guessing.

Take the free diagnostic →

The bigger finding

We started this analysis expecting to produce a ranking.

And yes, there is a ranking.

HDB dominates broad discussion. ABSD and CPF are among the most recurrent individual concepts. Grants, stamp duties, OTPs and financing appear again and again.

But after 56,417 messages, that is not the finding we'd put on a flashcard.

RES questions repeatedly become difficult when a fact changes the applicable rule, when two similar concepts need to be separated, or when several rules have to be applied in the correct sequence.

That pattern links topics that otherwise have very little in common.

ABSD and HDB grants are decision-variable problems.

Joint tenancy and future interests are relationship problems.

OTP and caveats are sequence problems.

So by all means learn the rules.

Then make sure you know what changes them, what distinguishes them, and what triggers them.

That's usually where the real question starts.

Sources for substantive rules

1. Council for Estate Agencies: Prepare for the RES examination.

2. IRAS: Additional Buyer's Stamp Duty (ABSD).

3. CPF Board: How much CPF savings can I use for my property purchase?.

4. HDB: Couples and families, flat grants and loan eligibility.

5. Singapore Statutes Online: Land Titles Act, easements.

6. Singapore Statutes Online: Land Titles Act, restrictive covenants.

7. Chan Lung Kien v Chan Shwe Ching [2017] SGHC 136, High Court of Singapore.

8. Singapore Statutes Online: Land Titles Act, life estates and remainder.

9. Ong Chay Tong & Sons (Pte) Ltd v Ong Hoo Eng [2008] SGCA 42, Court of Appeal of Singapore.

10. Singapore Statutes Online: Land Titles Act, caveats.

11. IRAS: Buyer's Stamp Duty; IRAS: Seller's Stamp Duty.

12. Li Jialin and another v Wingcrown Investment Pte Ltd [2024] SGCA 48, Court of Appeal of Singapore.

Dataset figures are derived from ConfirmPass's analysis of the Telegram export. The community data is used to identify discussion patterns; substantive legal and regulatory rules are checked separately against authoritative sources.