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I'm looking for a pair of Oakley glasses... Does anyone have any optical shop to introduce that give relatively good pricing for it?

This was brought up a few days ago, in the "President" 's policy suggestions... Instead of stopping people using their CPF to pay for their mortgages, why not reduce the prices if HDB flats and not peg them to market prices with land prices? Then Singaporeans will have more money to save with lower HDB flats prices. What Would Happen if You Couldn't Use Your CPF Savings to Buy a Home? https://sg.finance.yahoo.com/news/happen-couldn-apos-t-cpf-213202807.html In response to President Halimah's call for policy suggestions, economist Walter Theseira suggested disallowing the use of CPF savings for home purchases. The measure was proposed in order to address inadequate retirement saving. This could be a logical concern, as putting a significant amount of one's retirement into home may leave them with too few remaining assets to retire comfortably, especially given the uncertainties around the 99-year HDB lease. This proposal would likely have a massive impact on the housing market—over the past decade, around S$82 billion was withdrawn from CPF accounts in order to purchase HDB flats. Given the scale of this proposal, it is worth asking: how would homeowners and prospective homebuyers be affected? How Does The Current System Work? Currently, the Public Housing Scheme (PHS) allows individuals to use their CPF Ordinary Account to pay for a part of their HDB flat purchase. However, homebuyers are limited in the amount that they can withdraw from their CPF savings for the purchase of a HDB lease. Limits are based on the number of years remaining in the lease at the time it is purchased. How Would This Proposal Affect the Real Estate Market? In the short-term, we expect that housing prices would drop as result of proposed rule. The rule will likely prevent many prospective homeowners from being able to afford to purchase homes, as they would have significantly less money to contribute to the purchase. The decreased ability to buy a property should lead to a decline in market demand, which should in turn cause a decrease home prices. For example, we can approximate the scale of change with some basic calculations. In 2017, $7.4 billion was withdrawn for the purpose of purchasing new and resale HDB flats. There were 22,077 resale applications and approximately 17,500 new units in 2017. Assuming average resale values of S$450,000 and average BTO prices of S$310,000, the S$7.4 billion withdrawn in 2017 represents about half (48%) of the total HDB market transactions (S$15.4 billion). Although these are rough estimates, roughly 20% of this might be supporting the actual home value, while the other 30% is being used to pay interest on home loans. In the long run, it seems reasonable to expect that HDB prices could drop by 10-20% as developers acquiesce to consumers' reduced purchasing power while prospective buyers take longer to build enough savings to buy a flat. Good News for Prospective Home Buyers? Overall, this proposal appears that it would be a net-neutral event for prospective home buyers. On one hand, these individuals may have to save longer in order to purchase a home since they will not be able to access their CPF savings. On the other hand, a drop in housing prices could offset their reduced ability to purchase homes. Additionally, these individuals will benefit from having additional retirement savings since their CPF will be able to compound untouched over a long period of time. Bad News for Existing Homeowners However, this proposal definitely could have a negative impact for current property owners. If all buyers in the market are less able to afford current real estate prices, the market forces tend to adjust the prices lower until people can afford flats without the help of their CPF accounts. This would ultimately mean a reduction of wealth for those who already own HDB flats. Additionally, current homeowners may face another negative consequence. Currently, individuals re-selling their HDB flats must refund their CPF account based the principal amount withdrawn for their HDB flat purchase, as well as the amount of accrued interest that the savings would have earned if they had not withdrawn from the CPF account initially. If property values drop significantly, these homeowners will have much more difficult time meeting this refund requirement. How to Make a Smooth Transition The proposal would certainly incentivize increased personal savings and promote wealthier retirement, which could be a financially responsible goal. In order to make this transition easier, however, there are a few concepts to consider. First, because existing homeowners must refund their CPF account based on the amount withdrawn for purchasing a home, declining home prices could put them at significant financial risk. One way to make the proposed rule more palatable would be to decrease the refund requirements for current homeowners. Additionally, if HDB leases were extended, policy makers might be able to both buoy short-term home prices as well as mend a long-term structural issue related to HDBs. It could also help the owners of older flats, whose retirement savings could benefit from increased resale value if leases were easily extended beyond 99 years. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________ The truth behind proposal to prevent CPF for housing https://sg.finance.yahoo.com/news/truth-behind-proposal-prevent-cpf-065043359.html An academic’s suggestion which seemed to propose that the Central Provident Fund (CPF) monies no longer be allowed to be used to buy residential properties, has in recent days stirred the hornet’s nest. Walter Theseira, professor of Economics at UniSIM, made that suggestion in responding to President Halimah’s call for policy suggestions. Prof Dr Theseira said that the use of CPF savings for housing should be curbed in a bid to prevent the people from over-investing their savings on housing. He noted that people typically over-invest on housing as a way of “unlocking their CPF funds” and that installing measures to limit the use of CPF monies for housing could help the people conserve their savings for retirement and health. He said: “My view is that the CPF system tries to do a little too much, and we should consider focusing CPF on retirement and health…I do believe there is some over-investment in housing, which creates retirement risks if housing values do not grow, and this over-investment is because Singaporeans see housing as a way of unlocking their CPF funds.” One such measure the authorities could instate is slashing CPF contribution rates, Theseira suggested. This would mean that workers would receive more take-home pay that they could allocate to housing. “A CPF system focused on retirement and health would require lower contribution rates, and allow people more choices in using their higher take-home income on housing, investments, business, and family.” While Theseira advocated for a redesign of the CPF system “so that people no longer need to pay for housing out of CPF, by cutting contribution rates to focus on retirement and health,” he added that he is unsure what the right contribution rate should be. His views on the redesign of the CPF system drew sharp criticisms from the members of the public. Some were initially even confused that it was President Halimah who had made that suggestion in her call that there were ‘no sacred cows’. After the public uproar, the professor took to his Facebook to clarify that he did not argue for CPF to be removed completely or even for the housing component of CPF to be removed completely – since it may help people save for their first home. Theseira said: “What the right contribution rate should be, I cannot say. Perhaps some housing component remains important to help people save for their first home. Nor would I argue to remove CPF, because mandating retirement savings remains important, even for (especially for?) people who believe they can do a better job on their own. But this is a topic for another day.” Elaborating, the economist asked: “What choices would we make if a different policy was in place? What trade-offs would we accept if we designed policy? It’s easy to make fun of policymakers, and it’s also easy to critique policy. Finding workable solutions that promote the public interest is a lot harder, but more than ever, we need to work together to help improve policy in Singapore.” Prominent commentator on economic policies, Chris Kuan, said that Theseira’s views on CPF usage are generally sound. Kuan explained: “This bring Singapore back to normality in terms of what social security is used for and will go a long way to minimise the large trade-off between paying for housing and saving for retirement and healthcare. It will also reduce the known tendency of Singaporeans of over-extending housing affordability and hence driving up prices because of the instant gratification they received over CPF being released to pay for property when that gratification can only otherwise be realised decades into the future.” Kuan added that the trade-off between CPF being used for housing and retirement is a complex one, to which there are no easy answers. “There is always that easy argument that the whole problem of the trade-off between housing and retirement is due to HDB affordability and that tiresome mantra that all it takes is just make HDB affordable. Well, making HDB affordable from this point forward is the easy part. The difficult part is how to make HDB affordable without destroying the housing equity and hence retirement proposition of current HDB owners. That is the intractable part of the problem.” “I always held that the huge increase in CPF assets due to the high contribution rates are too much of a temptation for the government,” Kuan, a former international banker, said. Adding: “What better way to use it up than let public housing prices rise – it increases the government reserves which is essentially a very large transfer of wealth from households to the state and slow down the accumulation of government indebtedness.” Although highly unlikely, if Theseira’s proposal was accepted by the Government, it would mean that housing prices will drop drastically. This is because without CPF, many home buyers will be deterred by the large out-of-pocket down-payment that they would have to pay for their prospective homes. This would in turn lead to a decline in demand in the residential property market, driving down prices significantly. A scenario which would be prevented from happening at all costs by policymakers who have vested interests in a healthy real estate market. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________ What the forefathers has given Singaporeans the flexibility to buy homes with their CPF money in the past, and now these people are thinking of removing this scheme? https://www.cpf.gov.sg/Members/AboutUs/about-us-info/history-of-cpf The evolution of CPF a) CPF and housing – the twin pillars of retirement adequacy To help workers save for retirement, the CPF was established on 1 July 1955. Workers contributed part of their monthly income to their CPF to build up their retirement savings. In 1968, the government introduced the Public Housing Scheme, allowing Singaporeans to pay for the mortgages of their HDB flats using their CPF savings instead of having to use their take-home pay. This increased the affordability of housing and provided many Singaporeans with a home. Home ownership became a key pillar of retirement security as it relieves Singaporeans from having to pay rental fees out of their retirement funds during their senior years.

It's really a pain to drive to work in the morning nowadays. Driving is so different from few years back. While there is ERP, COE, all these measures have yet to prove their effectiveness. A true solution takes time and pain to implement, but at least it must be one that works. Therefore i am asking for good ideas/suggestions to improve the situation (only constructive suggestions please). Let me start with a few : 1) Setting up electronic notice boards to inform traffic condition before every entrance of expressway so that drivers can avoid jams. 2) Setting up a dedicated radio station to continuously broadcast traffic conditions 3) Setting up a SMS notification system for all drivers 4) Have more exits from expressway so that traffic can be diverted should there be a traffic jam 5) Privatise public transport so that there will be competition and hence improvement in the public transport 6) Build more expressways and flyovers (you see a lot of these in cities like Shanghai and Seoul etc) 7) Encourage students to take school buses instead of parents sending them to school

Fellas, am thinking of getting small daily car for wife to run errants , to school and grocery shopping with expected mileage of 200km to 300km per month I am looking at reg yr 2007-2008, auto, under $40k Any suggestions , ideas and experience sharing? Thanks

Dear Mods, I have a little suggestion here. Just wondering if it is feasible to start a sub folder here ~ perhaps under "others" dedicated to parenting? There are lots of forums out there dedicated to parenting no doubt, most of which however are female dominated. Males tend to feel awkward posting there and some may even be seen as chee ko peks, for camping in a female dominated environment. This parenting folder can benefit the MCF community by offering a channel - For experienced fathers to contribute their knowledge - For would be fathers (like myself now) to learn from real life experiences instead of textbook examples It is also an excellent channel to hear the muses, gripes, joys, trials, involvements, know-hows, mostly from a father/male's perspective. Please consider, I'm pretty sure this enables fathers and would be fathers to build cohesion and supports the aims of developing healthy and resilient forumers through a community channel. cheers

Can he just keep it to himself .......... :angry: yahoo news: Increase petrol taxes to ease COE prices of smaller cars: economist Singapore’s government could do more to help the environment through the Budget by increasing petrol taxes and raising the certificate of entitlement (COE) quota on smaller cars, an economist from Nanyang Technological University said on Monday. Speaking at a forum organised by the Economic Society of Singapore on Budget 2014, Ng Yew Kwang, professor of economics at Nanyang Technological University (NTU), said that raising petrol taxes would encourage motorists to take trips only when necessary. It would also relieve the pressure on rising COE prices, especially those for Category A vehicles, cars 1600cc and below and engine power not exceeding 97 kilowatts. He said that the government should increase the quota for the smaller vehicles to allow their COE prices to become more affordable, as these have already come close those of the bigger cars in category B. Increasing petrol taxes would offset the revenue impact from a decline in smaller cars' COE prices, he noted. The economics professor also suggested that the government increase taxes on luxurious cars and move to boost the number of taxis on the road. It had been expected by many analysts that Budget 2014, which was unveiled by Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam last Friday, would raise taxes on the rich. Instead, higher duties on cigarettes, alcohol and lottery betting were announced. Ng said he wanted to see more things in the Budget that would address environmental issues. He criticised the electricity rebates announced by Tharman as being “environmentally unfriendly” as they would encourage people to consume more electricity. Tharman said that 800,000 households in HDB flats would receive one-off vouchers to offset utility bills. Ng said providing a lump sum that households could choose to spend however they wished would have been a better alternative. link: http://sg.finance.yahoo.com/news/increase-petrol-taxes-to-ease-coe-prices-of-smaller-cars--economist-123004170.html Increase petrol taxes to ease COE but what happen to those already on the road, burnt a bigger hole in our pockets ..... Our petrol is already not cheap per liter ...

Hi brother, Going to be father in few months time? Now looking stroller for my baby boy. Any suggestion? And how much you bought yours?

I've noticed some threads being closed because a particular topic or news link has already been posted in another thread. Most of the time, it's really obvious which thread it is, but sometimes it isn't. That little news link could be submerged in a gargantuan thread dealing with some other topic entirely. Case in point: http://www.mycarforum.com/topic/2696504-singaporean-in-worlds-top-10-earning-pastors-list/ That thread was closed because that post had apparently already been made in another thread. I wanted to follow up on this discussion. So I skimmed through the Lite and EZ subforum. Nothing obvious caught my eye. So I still don't know which thread had that particular discussion going. I even went as far as to do a search for "pastor". I feel that I should never have had to do this just to follow a supposedly current topic that should've stood out on the forum index, but I did it anyway. Here are the results of the search:http://www.mycarforum.com/index.php?RPG=&app=core&DIS=&module=search&do=quick_search&req=&search_app=forums&search_content=titles&fullsearch=all&search_term=pastor None of the search results save the locked thread have a newer post than late 2013, meaning that they couldn't be referencing a brand new news article. So I'm left wondering which thread the mod was thinking about. Here are my gentle suggestions for our dear moderators: 1) Please go easy on closing threads as "duplicates". It's fine if it's an obvious dupe, but something as subtle as this, where the topic might be buried in another thread that started out discussing something else, is less clear-cut. Closing every single thread that *might* have *some* echo in another thread becomes oppressive if taken too far. 2) Even if you close, *please* link to the thread, or even better, the *actual post* (especially if buried in a large thread) that started out discussing the duplicate post topic. 3) And finally, wherever possible, *merge* rather than *close*. I understand there may be forum software limitations that hinder this, but if it's doable, then merging is far preferable to closing, especially when posters have taken pains to construct an argument about something to get the discussion going (behaviour we should be encouraging, rather than just having them link and submit). I hope my suggestions are taken in the positive way they were intended. I have been a moderator on international fora before, so I do speak from experience. I am aware of the challenges facing moderators everyday - frankly, it's a thankless task - but having a lighter touch can do wonders for the general tenor of the forum.

Hi, My family & I (3 adults & 3 kids) going to Perth coming late Nov till mid Dec, first time there renting a car to have a relaxing free & easy holiday. I'm planning to cover a few places down south of Perth like Margaret River, Walpole. I'll be deeply appreciate for kind advice & suggestions. Thanks in advance. Cheers.

there seen to be a layer of oily film on windshield that i failed to remove after many attempt. anyone also facing this problem ? had tried those commercial brand out there but none seen to work effectively. problem return after just 1 2 days. thanks in advance. Regards

Any suggestion ? The owner of this white golf cabriolet claimed that his lot is taken up, hence he is parking at the handicap lot ... There are surface car park below the block and a MSCP .... 20 meters away .... do not understand why die die must park below his block ... cannot walk a bit meh .... He is also taking issue that 2nd car owners are allowed to park in the surface lots, taking away his entitlement .... Whatever issue he is having, he should not be parking in a handicap lot ????

For newbies..........Use the Search Luke........ Remember the Search will be with you always........ To ask for opinions on stuff or topics discussed before without using the Search leads to the Dark Side called "not using the Search".

Hi, I am wondering would it be better to have a heading for travel under General so we could post everything about travel there. Easier for us to search and read like Road trips. Just a suggestion only.

Hi sgarmart moderators/owners I am a frequent visitor/user of sgcarmart and I would like to strongly suggest that you include an additional filter for Normal and OPC cars. Usually potential buyers would already have decided whether they want normal car or opc car hence being unable to filter out the unwanted type makes the search more tedious. Eg. someone looking for a cheap old normal car just to get from Point A to Point B may put in a $30,000 to $40,000 as budget criteria but in the end his search results will include many OPC cars which he doesn't want to consider. Hope you will take my suggestion into serious consideration. Thanks and keep up the good work!

For drivers and car owners only... come here to dump your complaints, sighings, and if possible, some suggestions ------> car-related prefered Car-related:- one off-duty long SMRT bus was hogging lane 2 when buslane was complete empty!! making the 3-lane busy road a 1-lane..... driver looked like a ah tiong, but i wont build a case just based on this...

Hi guys, im new here need some advise. Basically im driving a 1.6A Kia Koup at the moment. Reg march 2010, I bought it recently on Oct 2011 at the price of 73k and down 5k took a 68k loan. recently car gimme me abit of hiccup. advised by gf's uncle who owns a reputable workshop tat kia cannot buy 1, buy jap car better ( maybe he stereotype ba :( ). my fren ( a car dealer ), say he will help me sell at 72k. after some calculation, he say i will earn abt 4k, so the installment i pay consider rent car and downpayment lppl. but gd enuff consider i dun have to fork out money i sell. Ppl told me can breakeven/earn abit good enuff better let go cos korean car ( sigh ). frens/gf/family kp tis car 2 door, very troublesome. i personally feel tis car is very under powered, and as a "poser" status, really kana jio by ppl often and luff by some ppl ... zzzzz my concern is should i sell it? planning to get manual car and abt 2L if possible. cos most of the time i will ferry family/friends around and the car really under powered... struggling to move... especially upslope can die. car dealer fren told me to get balloon scheme, installment lower but at end of day no scrape value. anyone can tell me pros n cons of tis scheme? heard good n bad stuff about it... was tinking of changing to euro R or civic.. any suggestion? oh yes, my insurance is 3.2k ( under dad's name no NCD also no claim b4 )... looking for a car tat insurance lower ... prefer 2k+ or so...

In order for better communication between SMRT & the commuters, I think SMRT should set up a system to inform all commuters on any disruption or any delays of the train via sms. They can get commuters to register themselve online or via service counter, so in future, if there is any problem, immediately (without delay), send SMS to all registered commuters and also to all medias.

Dear All, First time visiting Hong Kong - free & easy, a Big Thank You for all suggestions

hey guys... anyone can share some tots... i thinkin of holding a party at like zouk or powerstation... anyone noe wat kind of budget should set for about 10-15 ppl? :p

Happy new year to all. Have already bought our (2 couple) air ticket to Bali (6 days) at May quite some time back and we have yet to come out our itinerary. Any suggestion where should we stay and what are the things we should do ( like white water rafting?) and any places we should visit? We intend to stay 3 days at near the seaside and another 3 days near to the nature, like ricefields or some way up in the mountain .. All suggestion are welcome. Thanks.

Time to get my Sunny a new coat of paint, she'll be 4 years old in a couple of months. I'm opting to stick to original Metallic Beige but CO says to switch to Latio Red. Any other colours to suggest? Gun Metal swee boh? Which spray painting WS should I go to? Recommendations please. This time I'll be doing PPS after the paint job, should have done it when I first got my car.

Recruit Seah Seah, Vincent Wijeysingha, Tan Jay See, Michelle Lee and Jeannette Chong-Aruldoss.

Just applied leave for this coming Friday to make this weekend a long weekend. As it was a last minute decision, haven't quite decided what to do yet. Planning to go somewhere not too far as hope to arrive back in Singapore by Saturday night or Sunday early morning. PS: May set off on Thursday night, right straight from work. Any suggestions? Many thanks.

Hello ladies and gentlemen , any suggestion? My birthday is coming and i wanna bring my family to eat some Coffee shop seafood , so called ''Zi Sar''( don't know how to spell but i think you guys can understand right ? haha..)