Dear Stacked Homes

My wife and I are avid readers of your site. We appreciate your candour and good advice (and writing!). We’re in a bit of a predicament and would appreciate some advice.

Background: we are in our early 30s with 2 young children and a helper. We earn in the low $400,000s, and currently stay in a HDB flat. We are in the process of selling off our flat, and would have approximately $1.2m to $1.4m in cash and CPF-OA thereafter.  

Problem: We are looking to upgrade to a terrace house near any of the following MRT stations: Upper Thomson, Bright Hill, Marymount, Bishan, or Lor Chuan. Reasons for this are proximity to schools and family. Factoring in future income growth, we believe we can comfortably afford something in the $3.6m range, but most decent condition terraces are now priced upwards of $4m. What is important to us is convenience