Bye, Xiao Bai Tu!

It is very expensive to own and drive a car in Singapore. Wary of the fact that uncontrolled growth in the number of vehicles will result in traffic jams (just like KL & BKK), the government has implemented a range of measures to manage car ownership and usage. These include the Certificate of Entitlement (COE), Vehicle Quota System (VQS), road taxes and Electronic Road Pricing (ERP). All motor vehicles must be registered with the Land Transport Authority (LTA).


The COE scheme has been one of the most controversial and hotly debated public policies ever implemented.
Anyone wishing to buy a car or motorcycle has to bid for a Certificate of Entitlement (COE). Each month, a certain number of COE's are released for bidding and if successful, the vehicle entitlement is valid for 10 years from the date of registration of the vehicle. 
Certain classes of vehicles like public buses, school buses and emergency vehicles are exempted from the scheme. 
COE's have become so expensive that it is cost prohibitive to own a car. The government wants the people to take public transport.


COE for 1 small car < 1.6L is curently about SGD30K and bigger car > 1600cc is > SGD40K.

RY has been thinkng of changing his > 3 year old Honda as the car is starting to give him problem (minor ones).
Well, it's part of the normal wear & tear issue.
So instead of buying a brand new one, he got a 2nd hand car as the COE price is deemed to be too much to stomach!

We'll be saying goodbye to our "Xiao Bai Tu" = "White Bunny" this coming Wed to welcome our new "Volvy".
(Note:  We give names to our cars, from the 1st green car = "Xiao Qing" (means Little Greenie), to 2nd blue car = "Bluey", then to the current white car = "Xiao Bai Tu" which means White Bunny and the next car shall be called "Volvy".)

Do you give names to your car?

Why get a car when COE is so expensive?

RY is in Sales & Marketing so Car is a necessity while it's optional to me as my job is desk bound.
We also need a car to bring us to KL & Ipoh to meet up with the relatives > 3 times a year.

Come next year when we move to our new house in town, we'll use the car less since we can walk or take Bus/ MRT to get to places wihin the city to avoid the hefty parking charges.