COEs for commercial vehicles, which include goods vehicles and buses, fell to S$78,001 from S$84,790, while motorcycle premiums closed at S$10,889, down from S$11,201 in the last exercise.
A total of 3,133 bids were received, with a quota of 2,411 COEs available.
The Land Transport Authority (LTA) announced last week that the COE quota for the November 2023 to January 2024 quarter would be increased further.
An additional 1,614 Category A, B and C COEs were reallocated, on top of the 1,895 reallocated COEs announced last month.
This brought the total supply of COEs for the quarter to 14,388.
With the big drop in COE prices, customers who bought their cars earlier may be eligible for rebates, especially those who booked Category B cars, dealers said.
Mr Aaron Kek, a sales manager for Leco Auto, told CNA that different dealers have different approaches when it comes to pricing. Leco Auto deals in both old cars and new Toyota, Honda and Mercedes Benz cars.
Some dealers may sell cars with a guaranteed COE, and customers may not get any money back even if the eventual COE price drops, he added.
Other dealers like himself may sell a car with a guaranteed COE pegged slightly lower than the price of the previous bidding exercise. For example, since Category B COE prices closed at S$158,004 in the previous exercise, the “rebate level” for those who recently bought cars could be pegged at about S$140,000.
Given that the price of Category B COE is now S$110,001, customers who are eligible for the rebate might get about S$30,000 back, said Mr Kek.
Consumers may also wait and see if COE prices will drop further, said Mr Arthur Wong, managing director of ACM automobiles, which carries cars from BMW, Audi, Mercedes Benz and Suzuki.
“When it’s a downtrend, people are keen but they want to see if it will drop more. But if it’s a slight uptrend, most of the time more people are willing to buy,” he added.
This is because if COE prices are increasing, buyers feel compelled to lock in their purchase at the lowest price possible, said Mr Wong.
Group CEO of online car marketplace Carro Aaron Tan said that while demand for used cars has remained largely flat, there has been a 20 to 25 per cent increase in people interested in selling their cars.
“I think we will start to see demand picking up after one or two more exercises,” he said, adding that second-hand sellers may increase their asking price to mitigate further falls in COE premiums.
Mr Tan expects Category A price to go down even more: “Then what will very likely happen is that people will jump in to buy new cars, versus a used car.”