To own a car in Singapore you have to pay from $70,000

The cost of certificates of ownership for cars and other vehicles in Singapore has increased. This was stated in a BBC News article published on October 5.

It is noted that in 1990, the city-state introduced a ten-year Certificate of Entitlement (COE) system as a means of combating traffic jams.

Before purchasing a vehicle, potential owners must obtain a COE. Certificates are auctioned every two weeks and the government controls their quantity (it depends on how many used cars are taken out of service)

Thanks to taxes and import duties, the COE system has made Singapore the most expensive country in the world to buy a car.

So, for small cars (engine up to 1600 cc) the document costs $76,000, which is four times higher than in 2020. To have a Category B car you have to pay more than $106,000.

The “open” category, which has no restrictions on which cars it can be used in, also reached a record price of nearly $111,000.

For example, a new standard Toyota Camry Hybrid costs around US$182,000 in Singapore, including COE and taxes. It is about six times more expensive than the US.

In this way, the country’s government seeks to encourage residents to use the public transportation system, which is recognized as one of the best in the world.

Singapore regularly ranks among the countries with the highest number of millionaires, but for the average resident with an average salary of about S$70,000 ($51,000), the COE system has made it difficult to buy a car.

At the end of last year, Singapore, with a population of about 5.5 million, had less than one million private cars on the roads.