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1. To URA, reconstruction or new erection have not much difference in fees as you still need to pay $6420. They are more concerned for reconstruction being hidden as A&A as A&A fees are 50% lesser. When a building is constructed, there are columns and beams (i'm excluding the underground foundation beams, etc for now as they are not relevant for now) above the ground. the beams have rebars which are tied back to the columns and the floor is usually cast together with the beams as the floor rebars are tied back to the beams. these columns and beams are the main structural components of your house. if you want to change the height of the storeys, there must be a way to create new structural beams to tie back to the existing columns so that the new floor can be cast. unless you want to create a new set of structural components around the existing ones to create the new floors in which case it would be better just to tear down the entire house and rebuilt. Whether you can reuse the existing columns for the new beams and floor slabs, etc would still need to be determined by a PE which would need to look at the existing plans for the house's foundation, etc. honestly speaking, if you are looking at such drastic changes as in changing the height of the storeys, you might as well just do a complete rebuilt. Because once you are done tearing down the floors, stairs, etc, you are basically left with some columns and underground beams, etc. If you want to want to add mezzanine floor to your new house and/or lift shaft, and if the existing foundation cannot support the new structure, you would need do built new foundation or strengthen the existing foundation which adds on to the cost. Another important point to note is whether the neighbour's house was built at the same time as your target house or not. if the 2 houses are built at the same time, there is a very very high chance that both houses share 1 set of columns along the shared party wall. this means that if you choose to redo the floor heights, you have no choice but to create a new set of foundation and columns for your own house as you can't hack the shared columns for you to tie the new beams back to it. 2. not sure where you got your 15m from. below is a picture from URA guidelines from 2011 which indicates the max allowed height of the storeys for a 2 storey landed house. The current max height limit is 12m. there is no way URA would allow you to retain the current height of the house once you change the roof profile. Their answer to you is that you have to follow the existing regulations. it doesn't matter what was done in the past as old regulations can't be applied anymore. If you want to "flatten" your roof, then you can only keep it within the red dotted lines which I've indicated in the 2nd picture as this is the current building envelope that URA allows for landed houses. So you can have a flat roof on top and then have open balconies at the areas where the slopping lines are at. Assuming the existing attic is 5m high from floor to the peak, you would need to drop it down by 1.1m. but your attic would still have a height of more than 3m internally which would be more than comfortable. When you do house hunting, you should have a clear idea of what you are looking for. The problem with houses which are neither here or there is that they are at a price point where you are paying for a "move-in" condition but you cannot afford/unwilling to rebuild the entire house. With these type of houses, you should either just have the mindset of doing a simple renovation and move in or just forget about it and move on to another house. If you have dreams of having a "perfect" house that fits all your needs, then you should be looking for a run-down original condition house and just pay for the land and do a rebuilt after that. Work out a proper budget to include expenses AFTER you sign the OTP. To do a decent A&A, you may need to spend 100k or up depending on your needs. A reconstruction could easily cost 400K and up. A full rebuilt could be 900K and up for a inter terrace and more than 1M for a semi-d and corner terrace.