Putting some cost to perspective.
My car park is 6K a year, 10 years and that's 60K on parking.
Petrol is about 6 - 7K a year.
Insurance 2 - 3K yearly,
Service throw in another 2K.

That's easy another 100 - 150K just maintaining the damn thing for 10 years (don't mentioned ERP and Roadtax), smaller cc cars maybe save 40 K? This example assumes there is a chap like me who die die must drive wait until COE drop then buy a car park in my office building.

Funny thing is when COE drops, people who already wanted to buy a car will just look a better model. Which means any COE savings just goes into buying a better. Korean car buyers will want Japanese cars etc.

There is really no need to speculate on if the COE is up down, cars are a waste of money in Singapore, they are not investment instruments. Got money go buy, cannot really afford invest wisely and make more then buy. It stupid to use your pot of cash to buy something depreciating when you really should be wealth building.

Need comments from you guys.
I'm quite old, 48, but I'm not progressing much in my career. Earning only $60k pa.
Wife is 42, earning $75k pa.
What should I do? Should I quit my job and start a business so that I can earn like $90k pa?
I have some savings of $200k to start the business.
Comments?

So easy to do business and make money meh?

Don't forget the CPF, insurance, annual and medical leave that you will forgo once you are self employed or do your own business. That can add up to a tidy sum on top of your wage.

What kind of business you have in mind? And why are you limiting yourself to only $90k pa? From $60kpa as an employee to $90k self employed minus all the above benefits is not worth the risk.

At your age, it may not be advisable to take high risks. Forgoing a $60k pa job (this is not low as the median income in Singapore is $47k pa) may not be the best thing to do as the potential gain of $30k above what you are earning is not worth the risk. If you say you can earn $1m pa in pure profits, then it is worth the risk but then which biz with a capital of $200k can guarantee you that? There is a high risk of you losing your hard earned savings of $200k and worse, after your biz failure, you can't get a job except that of a cleaner.

You should just focus on your expenses. You can cut down your expenses by stopping any bad habits such as drinking, gambling, womanising, etc. These are sinful anyways. If you drive, you can also get rid of your car and take the MRT instead. For holidays, don't spend too much, just limit to $1,000 pa.

This way, you can increase your savings. Assuming you have cleared your HDB loan, you can slowly build up your CPF fund. When you retire at 65, you can rent out your HDB flat room at $1,000 per room. In fact, you can even start doing this after your kids got married and move out. We must encourage more FTs to come here to financially support old people like you. Or else, there will be many jobless old people begging on the streets. Our HDB flat is our retirement asset, only if we can get enough FT tenants to rent our rooms.

Start a legal moneylending business with your 200k - charge 4% per month 48% per annum get 96k per year!

It is all for a good cause of course- the poor uncles/ aunties need money to pay for their cigarettes , Tiger beer, toto/ 4d , gambling boat / RWS and batam "leisure" trips! where else are they gonna get money from?

Look at the numerous Christmas promotion this weekend. Likely to hit high COEs again!

Yup, better secure your COE and new car this weekend. The longer you wait, the higher the COE and car price. If you have cars which are 8 years old and older, then it is the best time to change to a brand new car. You can use your big bonuses to buy.

Many people also save $350k pa, so they can just use the savings to buy a $300k new car and pay in cash. Don't overspend and buy a $500k car, be prudent and spend within your means. A $300k car is cheap if you have saved $350k this year.

Based on many factors such as overall increase in salaries and wealth and profit from flipping BTO flats, COE prices will continue to rise. By Jan 2015, Cat A should go to $70k and Cat B will go to $90k.

You are making me worried. Are you sure Cat b will hit $90k?
I better head for the showroom to book my ride this weekend..

I doubt it will go 90 for cat b but below 50 is also unlikely I mean for now till next year anyway, I got mine at 70. Pay what you are confortable with there is no perfect timing

70k is cheap in view of inflation over the past 10 years.
How much do you pay for your car overall?

I got a new Lexus $240k with COE $70k which is considered relatively cheap

Lol before starting already thinking about how much u can earn. I don't think u r prepared for wat u r getting urself into.

I paid about 235K thereabouts, I intend to hold the car for least 5 - 7 years so I considered factors like petrol consumption maintenance etc. COE wasn't really on my mind it was more of the overall sum + maintenance of the car.

That's quite a reasonable price. Is the car price (including COE) 50% of your annual salary?

Didn't give it too much thought actually, after calculations its about 60% of annual income.

The decision actually stemmed from needing a larger car and consideration of my liquid assets Mainly if I would miss the cash used to pay for the car (about 9%) if needed to make future investments.

I hope readers realize this poster is not being wise about how to spend. They have a net worth of 2.5m and he thinks that 100k is considered small and nothing. Assuming they have only 1 property they stay in and it is worth 2m and leveraged 50%, minus misc assets, this means their investible asset is about 1m or so. So a car which cost about 200k all in is about 20% of investible asset. This is not nothing by any measure. Probably 3-4 years return? Buying the car probably set them back a few years in terms of retirement goal.

My point is that net worth of 2.5m should not view 200k expense as nothing. It is a sizable portion! Only if they earn income say 300-400k per year, then perhaps they can feel it is something they can do every 3-5 years. Even then, I would rather save until net worth about 10m before feeling that I can afford easily a 200k car. Btw, I am speaking as someone whose passive income is >1m. I don't even view 100k as nothing!

this thread is funny. so many millionaires posting anonymously.

$38,000 pa. Diploma holder 2yrs working exp.

doing admin support job.

millionaires minus the value of their dwellings are nobody. these millionaires prepared to stay with strangers for meager sum by renting out 2 out of three bedrooms of their apartments. what is privacy to them carry no meaning. are they millionaires in real terms? only they themselves know.

You earn a lot. Assuming your wife earns as much as you, your household annual income is more than $700k. That's a big sum. You must be living in an Orchard penthouse condo or landed in D9.

A $235k car for you is very cheap. I have a weakness for cars, if I have your income, I would buy a $500k sports car. That's me. But alas I can only afford a $100k Korean car and that's 100% of my annual income.

If you have a passive income of $1m, assuming your returns from investable assets is 4% pa, then your investable asset is worth $25m. Wow! You're a multi millionaire. You are the richest among us in this forum! You must be living in a Nassim bungalow?

Next week COE bidding will be exciting as prices will shoot up due to the high pent up demand by many people. The demand for COE and new cars will come from:

1. Current drivers who are scrapping their cars. Every year in 2015 & 2016, there will be 100,000 drivers scrapping their cars so this means every year in 2015 & 2016, there will be demand for 100,000 COEs each year!

2. Those who can't afford 10 years ago but now can afford. For instance, 10 years ago, a family has annual income of $80k pa and they can't afford to buy a car. Now this family as an annual income of $200k pa. This family can easily afford a Cat A car.

3. Young graduates who earn big bucks. They want to buy a car to show off to their friends and colleagues to show that they are successful. This is also a big group as every year, there are thousands of young graduates.

4. BTO flat flippers. This group bought their HDB BTO flat for less than $200k ten years ago. Today, they can sell their flat and make profits of $300k - $400k. They can use $100k to buy a brand new Cat A car easily. No problem.

5. Property investors. This group has made tons of money over the last ten years. The good ones can make $1m in profits over the last ten years. They can easily buy a Cat A car costing $100k plus, not nay for themselves but one for the wife, one for the son and one for the daughter. So, there will be 4 cars in their household. This family typically stays in a big bungalow that can accommodate 4 cars or stay in a condo with many empty car lots.

So, expect Cat A COE to hit $68k next week. Cat B COE will hit $75k. They will continue to go higher in Dec and Jan 2015. By Jan 2015, Cat A will hit $75k while Cat B will hit $90k.

Please don't scare me. I am one of those who have been waiting patiently for COE to drop like a rock. I should have went in when Cat B was $65k last July. But alas, after the new C-class and Macan came in, the Cat B COE shoot back to $72k. I hope it don't continue to climb back to $80k. I will be shooting my foot for waiting.

You don't have to buy expensive Cat B car. Just buy an affordable Cat A car within your means. There are many Cat A cars selling at $80k, $90k, $100k plus. Be prudent, don't be a fool in overspending on a piece of metal which will have almost no value after ten years.

I need to get CatB bcos I need a MPV to transport my family and parents and in laws... How?

Just get a cheap MPV, only $130k plus. Or just call two taxis.

A word on prudence and living within our means.

Cars are ridiculously expensive in sg. If we have 1m spare cash, why not invest it in bonds and stocks and get back a 4-5% return annually? Live with our 5 year old jap car. In another 3 years time, you will have collected 150k to buy a new jap car and have your principal unchanged at 1m. We should always invest first before upping allocation to a depreciable asset like cars. Don't even buy a 234k Lexus! It is actually too much of asset for someone with 1m to invest.

So who can prudently buy a 500k sports car? It should be someone who has accumulated a networth in excess of 15m. Which means probably have 10-12m invested generating passive income of about 500-600k. This person should still be working and earning maybe another 500k-1m.

Btw, this person can't afford to live in gcb. Usually his house is worth 3-5m. Semi d or nice condo. The guy who lives in gcb has to be worth about 30m and up and even then it is slightly misallocated to live in a property worth half or more of his net worth.

The new Lexus NX and Jaguar XE shall push it up further

Isnt Lexus a Japanese car?

I agree. A person with a net worth of $2m should just buy a $100k Korean car. He should invest his $1m in a dividend stocks portfolio generating 5% dividend to get $50k pa dividend. He can then buy the Korean car after two years ($100k dividend in total). He then use the Korean car (Korean cars nowadays are very good quality and car last many years) for 10 years. He can save $400k of dividends over 8 years and after that can buy another $100k Korean car. This way his $1m will remain intact or even grow as the value of his stocks grow over 20 years.

I see many lower income group HDB dwellers wasting their precious money on expensive continental cars and they like to complain money not enough or cannot retire, bla bla bla. These HDB dwellers should not even own cars in the first place. They should just take the MRT.

The lower HDB peasants should consider to migrate to JB and clear away from our roads. Then we no need ERP.

Let me refute points 2.3.4 &5

Point 2 - 10 years ago earning 80k pa, now 200k pa. 10 years ago, newly married, no burden. Now got 2 children plus parents no longer work and maybe diagnosed with some illness. So how would you use your income?

Point 3 - how big is your "big bucks"???
Sure, we will have those SMU summa cum laude law trade getting 5k for starting pay BUT are there THOUSANDS of fresh grads with starting pay of 5K?

Point 4 - BTO flat flippers. If you are BTO flat owners, 5 years ago, your family earned NO more than 8k (income ceiling was revised 3/4 years ago nia). After pocketing a profit of 200k, the sellers will buy a car and sleep in it and along the way have 2 kids and can use the boot and bonnet as baby cribs?

Point 5 - you said the good ones make 1 million in the last 10 years. And a savvy investor will forgo 40% of his gains to get 4 cars?? And they are staying in bungalows big enuf for 4 cars??
For your info. Bungalows cost at least 10 million and above. If a person is rich enough to stay in a bungalow, he would not have to rely on flipping to make a fortune. Really rich folks make their money when a) their companies ipo b) through business and franchises c) through the stock market ...

After the property agent(s) stop their "you have made it, top 15%" posting, the car dealers are here LOL

Your rebuttal doesn't hold water. Try harder.

Dear unregistered guest (just like me),

Could you point out the folly to my rebuttal as I did to your sales pitch?

2nd Nov COE bidding next week

Don't be surprised if COE prices jump

Everyone is rushing to buy their new car before the lunar new year

Everyone wants to drive a new car to show off to their friends and relatives

Frankly if I had to depend on my income alone I probably wouldn't have bought it, factoring my cash at hand then I did. I have a fair amount of obligations i.e mortgages on investment properties (covered by rental but who knows how secure), kids schooling, insurance etc, my wife is not working either taking care of the kids which is hard work itself. I stay with my folks which saves me mortgage and maid cost.

I have a weakness for cars too, I was really tempted to go with a higher spec car that would cost 400 plus K after including various options. Judging from the comments on the forum most people people think its just the base price that matters, actually its the maintenance that really hurts the most and the AD's here confirm will chop the buyer for that. I'm not at that level yet to pay that kind of cost, but if I were to buy one in the future it will most likely be 2nd hand.

Hey least you got a car right, my first car in Singapore was an old jap car with a broken gearbox. If your a car enthusiast least you got a chance to mod the car up, try that on a conti car and the error codes will light up like a xmas tree.

However spending 100% of your income doesn't sound good'you might wanna manage that. Singapore is the worse place for car enthusiast so on of my friend built himself a track car in Msia and keeps it with his pal probably best way to get around that?

Well I can wait. CoE will drop like a rock after next Apr15 when the tsunami of increase quota released. HUAT AH.

Well, you can wait till the cows come home. Good luck!

Judging by the forumers here, we can see so many of them are rich. This is a just a small sample of the population in Singapore. There are many people like forumers here. They are well to do and many are millionaires.

10 years ago I am just a common man in the street HDB dweller. Today I am a millionaire living in a nice modern condo. There are many success stories like mine, in fact many are more successful and much more richer than me. For me, buying cars at current COE price is no big deal, anyway we will all die so just buy and enjoy a car before you die. Buy a cheap car will do.

Are you the millionaire that only could buy a Korean car??

As a multi millionaire, I can't see myself spending $200k on a conti car, let one $500k. It's going to be close to worthless after 10 years. I can triple my money over 10 years. Every dollar counts. That's how I became a millionaire in the first place. I now am financially independent and don't have to work for others to be their slaves. Many people are simply slaves to their jobs because they are not financially independent. A good Korean car is good enough for me. Why do I need to buy an expensive car? People around me know I'm rich, I don't have to convince them.