The open category of COE for use in any vehicle has for the first time breached S$150,000.
While car ownership may be argued to be expensive here, it is nevertheless nothing compared to our neighbour’s down south. And this is especially as CNA reports that Singapore has recently saw premiums for its Certificate of Entitlement breach S$150,000 (RM 518,000) for the first time ever, in the latest round of bidding exercises conducted on the 4th of October.
Now just for those who are unfamiliar with car ownership procedures in Singapore, apart from the price of the car, those who intend to own a vehicle in the tiny island nation will also need to purchase a COE from the government to legally entitle ownership of said vehicle. There are currently 5 categories of certificates available to cater to different classes of vehicles, and it is the open category of COEs that has seen its premium generate that headline-grabbing figure.
These open category COEs, which can be used for any vehicle type (but mainly used by Singaporeans on large, premium cars), used to cost S$144,640 (RM 499,000) during its last tender. This time round though, bidding for these certificates have pushed its prices up beyond the S$150,000 (RM 518,000) mark, and ended up rising to S$152,000 (RM 525,000).
What more too is that while the open category COEs are the ones grabbing all the headlines, it is also worth highlighting that the category B COEs (that entitle ownership of cars above 1,600 cc and 97 kW) have also jumped in price from S$140,889 (RM 486,000) in the last tender to S$146,002 (RM 504,000) today. Even motorcycle COEs have seen its price rise slightly this time round, with bidding closing at S$10,856 (RM 38,000) from S$10,700 (RM 37,000) in the last exercise.
Interestingly however, premiums for Category A COEs (which are for cars below 1,600 cc and 97 kW) have closed at S$104,000 (Rm 360,000), which was down from a record S$105,000 (RM 363,000). This slightly softening in price can be attributed to Singapore’s Land Transport Authority reallocating an additional 300 Category A certificates for October. A move that marks a 24% increase in the quota for these specific certificates available for the month.
Though while on the adjacent subject of supply and demand, this increase in quota of Category A COEs has nevertheless made little to dent the still overwhelming demand for these certificates in general. That is as of the 2,010 certificates up for grabs in this latest round of bidding, there were a total of 2,795 bids for it. It therefore stands to reason that despite having surpassed a new cost milestone, the trend of COE prices will likely only continue to go up from here.
Add to that too the already staggeringly sky high prices of cars in Singapore, and it really would seem that the prospect of owning a car in the tiny island nation is steadily requiring deeper and deeper pockets. So it is no wonder lah why there are so many Singaporean-registered cars are crossing the causeway to pump our subsidised petrol…
