COE 2026–2027: Buy Now or Wait? The Honest Answer, With Charts

TL;DR

Prices likely stay firm through December 2026 — an EV incentive worth up to $15,000 expires on 31 Dec, and the year-end rush it creates could mark the peak of this cycle. A real but modest correction looks likely in the first half of 2027 as a wave of 10-year-old cars gets scrapped and demand takes a breather. But this is a window, not a new normal — don't expect $60k COEs to return. If your current COE outlasts mid-2027, waiting has a genuine payoff. If it doesn't, don't gamble on it.

The one idea that explains COE

COE isn't priced like a normal product. Think of it as the amount left over after Singapore households decide what they can afford to spend on a car in total. The car, taxes and dealer margin get paid first — the COE premium soaks up the rest. This is why cheaper cars haven't made COE cheaper: every dollar the EV price war shaves off the car itself becomes a dollar available to bid. Hold onto that idea; everything below follows from it.

Supply: the 10-year echo is arriving — with a catch

Every COE lasts 10 years, so today's supply is an echo of registrations a decade ago. 2016 and 2017 were bumper registration years, which means 2026 and 2027 are bumper deregistration years — roughly 70,000 cars were already aged 9–10 by late 2025. When cars are scrapped, their certificates flow back into the quota for bidding. That's the well-known case for relief.

The catch almost nobody prices in: since 2023, LTA has been borrowing from this exact wave — injecting up to ~20,000 extra COEs early by bringing forward certificates from cars guaranteed to be deregistered in the coming peak. When those cars are finally scrapped, their quota is not released again. The wave is real, but a slice of it has already been spent.

The 10-year echo — and the slice already used

Registrations then vs certificates returning now (illustrative proportions)

Quota grows as the wave arrives — but flatter and longer than raw registration numbers suggest, because part of it was brought forward.

The quiet variable: owners who renew instead of scrapping

Not every 10-year-old car gets scrapped. Owners can renew the COE by paying the PQP — a 3-month average of recent prices — and every renewal is one certificate that never returns to the bidding pool. Renewal rates collapsed from around 42% in 2019 to just 13% in 2023, then recovered to about 22% in 2024–25.

The renew-or-scrap math has never leaned so hard toward renewing: a ~$123k renewal versus a ~$280k+ replacement car. Pulling the other way: renewing a petrol car today means driving it well past 2030, when all new cars must be cleaner-energy models. Our read: renewals drift up toward 25–30% for this cohort — and every extra percentage point quietly removes roughly a thousand certificates a year from future supply.

The renewal rate: collapsed, now recovering

Share of expiring car COEs renewed instead of scrapped

Each percentage point of renewals ≈ ~1,000 certificates a year that never return to bidding.

Demand: why the rest of 2026 stays hot

A $15,000 deadline. The EV Early Adoption Incentive — worth up to $15,000 off an EV's registration fees — expires on 31 December 2026. Deadlines like this reliably pull purchases forward; expect showrooms and bidding to run hot into December, very possibly producing the highest premiums of this entire cycle in Q4.

Cheap EVs feed the fire. Chinese EVs at $30–50k below equivalent German cars don't relieve COE — remember the one idea — they pull more buyers into the market and route powerful-but-affordable EVs into Cat A under the 110kW rule. It's no accident Cat A and Cat B closed within $2,000 of each other last round.

Dealer bidding structure. Guaranteed-COE packages mean dealers must secure certificates for cars already sold, so a large share of each round's bids is effectively price-insensitive. With bids running ~1.5× the available quota, softness is structurally hard to come by.

What's stacked under Q4 2026 demand

The forces keeping premiums firm into December

The top block disappears on 1 January 2027 — which is exactly why early 2027 looks different.

Putting it together: three scenarios for Cat A

Nobody can predict COE — anyone who claims otherwise is selling something. What we can do is map the plausible paths. In the base case, premiums hold $120k–133k through December, then correct 10–20% through the first half of 2027 as the incentive rush ends just as scrapped-car supply keeps arriving — Cat A finding $100k–115k. In the buyer-friendly case, the January demand air-pocket is deep and renewals stay low: $90k–105k by mid-2027, the best window since 2021. In the tight case, renewals surge and wealth demand instantly fills any gap: the correction stalls above $115k and grinds higher again.

Cat A scenario map, H2 2026 → 2028

Illustrative ranges, not predictions — the shaded areas are the honest part

Why prices re-firm into 2028: the borrowed supply is never returned, and the 0% vehicle growth policy only comes up for review in January 2028.

So — buy now or wait? A practical guide

Your COE expires before mid-2027 Don't gamble on the window. Waiting exposes you to the Q4 rush and the risk the correction underdelivers, while your car's value keeps ticking down. Plan the replacement (or renewal) on your schedule, not the market's.

Your COE runs past mid-2027, and you're flexible Waiting has a defined, genuine payoff window in the first half of 2027 — but treat it as a window, not a promise. Set a target price, watch the markers below, and be ready to move when it opens.

You're considering renewing your COE The renewal price (PQP) is a 3-month average, so in a rising market it's cheaper than the live auction — right now about $123k vs a $129k spot for Cat A. Renewal permanently forfeits your PARF rebate though, so run the numbers before deciding. Financing exists for renewals too.

You're eyeing an EV The up-to-$15,000 incentive is real money and it's gone on 31 Dec 2026 — but you'll be buying into the hottest bidding of the cycle. The incentive vs premium trade-off is genuinely case-by-case; it depends on the exact car.

Five markers that will tell us who's right

1The Aug–Oct quota announcement (due this month): growth above ~5% vs the current quarter says the supply wave is winning.

2Renewal numbers: a climb toward 30% quietly cancels the buyer-friendly scenario.

3Spot price vs PQP: spot persistently above PQP keeps renewals attractive — the tightening feedback loop.

4EV share of Q4 registrations: confirms how big the year-end rush really is.

5Any government hint on the vehicle growth rate review (Jan 2028): even a token increase changes the 2028 picture.

We track every one of these on the live COE page — results, demand ratios, PQP and the trend chart, updated every bidding round.

Where does your situation fit?

Expiring COE, renewal decision, or timing a purchase — tell me your car and timeline and I'll give you a straight, personalised read. No obligation.

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Figures from LTA published data and public sources as of 12 July 2026. Scenario ranges are illustrative analysis, not predictions or financial advice. COE outcomes depend on policy decisions and market conditions that can change without notice.