Singapore Expats

How does the CPF work??

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jp900
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How does the CPF work??

Post by jp900 » Fri, 14 Dec 2007 8:20 pm

Hi, I just converted into PR and I'm not sure how the CPF stuff will work.

If I make, say, $100 in a month, how much would this go to

a) Personal income tax? (my 2nd year in Singapore)
b) CPF from my salary
c) CPF from the employer (is this correct?)

Also, they say I can buy an apartment using CPF money. Would I still need to give some exhorbitant down payment at the insane rates in Singapore now, or can CPF be used to buy the house without a down payment?

The cpf.gov.sg website is a labyrinth of options without telling me a simple breakdown of how much will go where.

Thanks for any tips!

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jpatokal
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Post by jpatokal » Fri, 14 Dec 2007 8:47 pm

Income taxes have nothing to do with CPF. Your share of the CPF is substracted from your salary, and the employer pays their share on top. If if you earn $100 and your CPF percentage is 10%, you receive $90 in salary and get $20 in your CPF account ($10 from you, $10 from the employer).

If you use it for a down payment, your CPF is treated just like money, so for (say) a $100k down payment you can use up $50k of CPF and $50k of your own money. As a new PR with low starting CPF rates, it'll be years until you've built up a sufficient pot though.
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