Available$9,888–$12,888 · On the HDB list of 62 · AVS licence BR25052 · updated August 2026
Coton de Tulear Singapore: Yes, It Is HDB-Approved
Coton de Tulear Singapore, the short answer: $9,888–$12,888 from an AVS-licensed farm, and it is on HDB’s list of 62 approved breeds, named in full. It weighs 4–6 kg as an adult and lives 14–16 years, which is a long time to be right about a housing question.
Almost nobody writing about this breed here mentions the approval, and almost nobody explains the price. Both are on this page.
Is the Coton de Tulear HDB-approved?
Yes. HDB approves 62 named breeds and the Coton de Tulear is one of them, listed under its own name, so it can be kept in a flat subject to the one-dog rule. Confirm your own dog with HDB rather than relying on a seller.
Where it sits on the list
Between the Czech Terrier and the Dachshund, in the alphabetical run of 62 names. It is one of the less familiar entries, which is exactly why buyers miss it. The full HDB-approved breed list sets out every name, and this one is there in full.
We have spent this month writing the opposite answer on other pages. The Goldendoodle is not on the list and the Cockapoo is not either, and in both cases the page had to tell a flat-dwelling reader to look elsewhere. This breed is the reverse of that problem.
What you still have to do yourself
Approval attaches to the named breed, so the paperwork has to say Coton de Tulear. A general description on a receipt, something like small white terrier, is not the same thing and will not help you if it is ever questioned.
- Check the breed is written on the dog’s own documents, not just described in conversation.
- Licence the dog, which is a separate legal requirement from the breed being approved.
- Confirm the one-dog rule against your own household before you commit.
None of that is onerous. It is the difference between being allowed to keep the dog and believing you are.
A condominium or landed home carries no breed restriction of this kind at all, so the list only decides the question for flat buyers. It is the flat buyers who are usually told to forget an unusual breed, which is what makes this one worth writing down.
Available now
Coton de Tulear Singapore: puppies available now
Coton de Tulear Singapore price searches usually end at an enquiry form or a waitlist. Every puppy here carries its price on the card instead, and the section below explains what that price is made of.
The 3 Coton de Tulears now at the farm are listed below, each with its own photo, age, colour and price. The price on the card is the price for that puppy.
Available
Available
AvailableWhere these puppies come from
These particular puppies were imported rather than bred here, which is the ordinary case for this breed and the reason for the price. They are held at our AVS-licensed farm, licence BR25052, in the Sungei Tengah cluster, and you can come and meet one by appointment before anything is decided.
The card price is the price
Not a starting point, and not a figure that moves once you are interested. Every puppy available this week sits on one page under the same rule.
Why is Coton de Tulear so expensive?
Because it is imported, and because almost nobody breeds it here. That is the entire answer, and it is worth more than a paragraph of atmosphere about rarity.
Every one of these dogs advertised in this country has come from somewhere else, ours included. There is no local supply to price against.
These are the most expensive dogs on this site, by a wide margin. Buying Coton de Tulear puppies here means buying imported dogs, and we would rather say why than let the number sit on a card unexplained.
What sits inside the price
Almost none are bred here
Singapore has a small number of licensed breeding farms and they concentrate on breeds that sell steadily. A breed that sells three or four dogs a year does not support a local breeding programme, so the supply comes in from abroad or it does not come at all.
That is a straightforward economic fact rather than a complaint. It does mean the price of this breed here has almost nothing in common with the price of a common small breed, and comparing the two figures tells you very little.
What the price covers and what it does not
It covers the puppy, the veterinary work done before it goes home, and the papers that travel with an imported dog. It does not cover the fifteen years afterwards.
- Covered: the vet health check, vaccinations to date, deworming at each visit, microchipping, health certification and ancestry records.
- Not covered: grooming, which for this coat is a standing appointment rather than an occasional one.
- Not covered: your own dog licence, insurance, food, and the vet bills of a long life.
A dog that lives 14–16 years costs more after the purchase than at it, whatever the purchase was. That is truer of this breed than of most, because the coat work never stops.
Is the Coton de Tulear rare?
Yes, and unusually for a claim a seller makes, you can check it in about a minute.
- The breed comes from Madagascar, where it is the national dog.
- It takes its name from the port city of Tulear on the south-west coast.
- It reached Europe and North America late, which is part of why it is still uncommon almost everywhere, Singapore included.
Getting a Coton de Tulear anywhere means joining a short supply. Here it means joining a very short one.
Search the breed name alongside Singapore and look at what comes back.
- One small breeder.
- A page about a single named dog, by name.
- Several Instagram accounts belonging to individual owners.
- Two worldwide breed encyclopedias with nothing local in them at all.
- A book.
That is the whole field.
A common breed returns pages of listings. This one returns individual dogs, by name. That is what scarcity looks like from the outside, and it is better evidence than any figure we could put in front of you.
We are not going to publish a number of Coton de Tulears in Singapore, because no such figure is published and inventing one to support our own argument would be worse than saying nothing. What we can tell you is what we have, which today is 3.
Coton de Tulear Singapore rescue and adoption
We sell puppies and we do not rehome adults, so we are the wrong people to ask about a Coton de Tulear Singapore rescue. It is a fair question to ask and the honest answer is that a breed this uncommon rarely turns up in local shelters, though it is worth asking them rather than assuming.
If adopting matters more to you than the breed does, our guide to adopting a dog here sets out the route, and it costs us a sale to say so.
What waiting actually looks like
With a common breed you choose. With this one you wait, and then you take the puppy that is there. The gap between litters reaching Singapore is measured in months rather than weeks, and a household set on a particular colour or sex may wait considerably longer.
If that sounds like a sales technique, compare it against the alternative on offer. A waitlist you can leave at any time is a reasonable thing to join. A deposit for a dog nobody can name a date for is not, and we do not ask for one.
The coat: cotton, not fur, and this climate
The breed is named for its coat, and the texture is the reason it behaves the way it does here. It is cotton-like rather than oily, soft all the way through, and it grows continuously instead of shedding out on a cycle.
A coat that does not shed does not clear itself. Loose hair stays in the coat instead of landing on your floor, which is the trade people actually make when they buy a low-shedding breed, and in this humidity that trade has a deadline attached.
Why this coat mats faster in Singapore
Brushing to the skin
Brushing your Coton de Tulear means working in sections, lifting the coat and going from the skin outwards. Brushing over the top feels productive and leaves the layer underneath exactly as it was.
How often should I groom my Coton de Tulear is the question behind all of this, and daily is the honest answer for a coat kept long. Every other day is survivable. Weekly is how a dog ends up clipped off rather than brushed out, and that decision usually gets made by a groomer rather than by you.
Drying, which matters more here
Dry all the way to the skin after any bath, and after rain. A towel-dried dog in this climate is a damp dog, and a damp cotton coat is where both matting and smell begin.
Plenty of owners here settle on keeping the coat in a shorter clip year round. It is less striking than the long show coat and it is a great deal more practical in tropical weather, and there is nothing wrong with choosing it.
Do Coton de Tulear dogs smell?
Not by nature. This is not a heavily oiled coat and the breed has no particular reputation for odour, so a Coton that smells has usually been dried badly or has a skin problem worth showing a vet.
Is Coton de Tulear high maintenance?
The coat is. The dog is not. That distinction is worth holding on to, because the two get collapsed into one answer on most pages about this breed and they point in opposite directions.
You are taking on a grooming routine for the life of the dog. In exchange you get a small, even-tempered, quiet companion that is one of the easier breeds to actually live with.
What a Coton de Tulear is like to live with
Companionable, bright and notably even-tempered. This is a breed developed to be somebody’s dog rather than to do a job, and it shows in how much it wants to be in the room with you.
Do Coton de Tulear dogs bark a lot?
Less than most small companion breeds. They will tell you somebody is at the door and then generally stop, which is a different animal from a small dog that barks at everything and cannot be talked out of it.
In a flat that matters more than anywhere else, and it is a fair part of why this breed suits the housing it is approved for. No breed comes with a promise about temperament, and a bored dog of any kind will find something to say about it.
What are the downsides of Coton de Tulear?
Stated as downsides rather than dressed up as quirks, there are three worth knowing before you commit.
- The coat is daily work in this climate, and it stays daily work for 14–16 years.
- The dog is people-focused, so a house empty from morning until night is the wrong home.
- They are hard to find and expensive here, so you wait and you pay rather than choose.
Any of those three is a good reason to buy a different breed, and we would far rather you concluded that on this page than a year into owning one.
Are Cotons hard to potty train?
No, and they are quicker than several small breeds because they learn readily and take well to routine. What decides it is you rather than the dog: pick the spot before the puppy arrives and do not move it.
How the Coton de Tulear differs from a Maltese
This is the comparison buyers actually make, and for once nothing legal rides on getting it right. Both breeds are on HDB’s approved list, so a mistake here costs you the dog you wanted rather than the right to keep it.
The differences are in the coat and the build. A Maltese carries a fine, silky, straight coat; this breed carries a fuller cotton-textured one that sits away from the body rather than falling flat against it.
| Coton de Tulear | Maltese | |
|---|---|---|
| Coat texture | Cotton-like, full, stands away | Fine and silky, falls flat |
| On the HDB list | Yes | Yes |
| Adult size | 4–6 kg | 2–4 kg |
| Lifespan | 14–16 years | 12–15 years |
| How easy to find here | Rare, and imported | Common, bred locally |
The Bichon Frise gets mistaken for it too, and is also on the list. If what draws you is a small white low-shedding dog rather than this breed in particular, our breed directory marks which of our breeds are HDB-approved on every card, and several of them are easier to find and considerably cheaper.
We are aware that sentence points at cheaper dogs we also sell. It is still the right thing to say on a page about the most expensive breed on this site.
Health and how long they live
A long-lived and generally robust small breed. Our own record gives 14–16 years, which is towards the top of the range for any dog and is one of the genuine attractions here.
The recognised concerns in the breed are hip dysplasia, luxating patella, and eye conditions including progressive retinal atrophy. Naming them is not a warning that your dog will have them. It is the list you should be asking a breeder about by name rather than accepting a general assurance that the parents are healthy.
How long do Coton dogs live?
14–16 years on our own record. Plan for the upper end of that rather than the lower, because the households that struggle with this breed are usually the ones that budgeted, in time as much as money, for a shorter commitment than they got.
What to ask for on an imported dog
An imported puppy should arrive with its paperwork, and you are entitled to see it before you decide anything. This is the one area where an imported dog is easier to check than a locally bred one, because the documents have to exist for the animal to travel at all.
- The pedigree, and what the parents were screened for, named condition by named condition.
- The health certification that travelled with the dog, and its dates.
- The vaccination and deworming record, with the dates written in rather than described.
- The microchip number, and confirmation it matches the paperwork in front of you.
A seller who cannot produce those for an imported dog is telling you something. Ours are at the farm and you are welcome to read them there.
Coming home at about week 9
What a Coton de Tulear costs in Singapore depends on the puppy, and ours are $9,888–$12,888. That is the range of the dogs listed above rather than a headline figure, and it moves as the roster turns over.
How much does a Coton de Tulear cost?
More than any other breed on this site, for the four reasons set out above. If you have read this far and the number still looks wrong to you, that is a legitimate conclusion and a cheaper breed on the approved list will give you a very good dog.
The week the puppy travels home
Core doses at weeks 6 and 8 at the farm, with deworming at each visit, and homecoming about a week after the second. The third falls at week 12 with your own vet, and an optional fourth at week 16 if your vet advises it. The vaccination schedule sets out the whole first year.
Where the information on this page comes from
- The puppies, the photographs and the prices: the live roster sheet, synced August 2026. Every card is a real puppy at the farm and the price on the card is the price. The range on this page is read from the site’s breed data, which is itself set from the listing rather than typed.
- The HDB answer: the 62-breed list published on our own HDB page, checked for this page. The Coton de Tulear appears on it by name, between the Czech Terrier and the Dachshund. Confirm your own dog against HDB’s own pet rules, confirmed in a browser on 25 August 2026 since the host blocks automated requests.
- Why the price is what it is: our own listing records, which give the origin of the current puppies as Ireland and describe the line as a show breeder with pedigree. The four components are set out in the figure above and none of them is an estimate we invented.
- Adult size and lifespan: our own breed record, 4–6 kg and 14–16 years.
- The coat: first-party, from keeping this breed at the farm in this climate, and stated as a routine to keep rather than a warning about the breed.
- Licensing: AVS. Our breeder licence is BR25052, checkable on the public register rather than something to take our word for.
- Puppy vaccination: the canonical weeks used across this site, core doses at weeks 6 and 8, homecoming at about week 9, the third at week 12 and an optional dose at week 16.
- What we deliberately do not do here: publish a number of these dogs in Singapore, because no such figure exists and we will not invent one to support our own rarity argument; claim the breed is hypoallergenic, because low shedding is a fact about a coat and allergy is a fact about a person; or name the breeder, the exporting kennel, or any competing seller, shop or social account. Puppy Singapore is selling these dogs and this page still tells you that a cheaper breed on the same approved list would give you a very good dog.
Roster synced August 2026. Information last checked 26 August 2026.
Coton de Tulears in Singapore, answered
Is the Coton de Tulear HDB-approved?
Yes. It appears by name on HDB’s list of 62 approved breeds, so it can be kept in a flat. That surprises most people, because the breed is uncommon enough here that buyers assume it cannot be on a government list at all. Approval attaches to the named breed, so make sure the paperwork for your own dog says Coton de Tulear rather than carrying a general description like small white terrier, and confirm it with HDB rather than relying on any seller, us included.
Why is a Coton de Tulear so expensive?
Because almost none are bred in Singapore. The ones we list are imported from a show breeder abroad, with pedigree papers, and the origin recorded on our own listing is Ireland. The price carries the cost of the import, the health testing behind a show line and the breeder’s own pricing, rather than a local markup we have added. It is the most expensive breed on this site and we would rather explain the number than leave you to guess at it.
Is the Coton de Tulear rare in Singapore?
Yes, and you can see it for yourself rather than take our word for it. Search the breed name with Singapore and the results are one small breeder, a page about a single named dog, a handful of Instagram accounts and two worldwide breed encyclopedias. There is no page after page of listings, because there are very few of these dogs in the country at any one time.
How big does a Coton de Tulear get?
Small and consistently so. Our own breed record gives 4–6 kg as an adult, which is one of the narrower ranges on this site, because this is an established breed rather than a cross. A cross inherits a range of possible sizes; a breed with a written standard behind it does not vary nearly as much.
Do Coton de Tulears shed?
Very little. The coat grows continuously in the way human hair does rather than shedding out in a cycle, which is why loose hair around the home is rarely the complaint with this breed. That is a claim about the coat and not about allergies. Whether a particular person reacts to a particular dog is something only time in the same room can settle, and no breeder can promise it.
Are Coton de Tulears high maintenance?
The coat is, the dog is not. The texture is cotton-like rather than oily, so it holds humidity and mats against the skin if brushing slips, which in this climate happens faster than new owners expect. Set against that, the temperament is one of the easier ones to live with: even-tempered, not highly strung, and content to be near you rather than needing to be entertained.
Do Coton de Tulear dogs bark a lot?
Less than most small companion breeds. They are alert and will announce a visitor, but they are not typically a persistent barker, and they are not usually a reactive one either. In a flat with neighbours through the wall that is worth more than it sounds, and it is one of the reasons the breed suits the housing it is approved for.
What are the downsides of Coton de Tulear?
Three real ones. The coat is daily work rather than weekly, and in this humidity that is not negotiable. The dog is genuinely people-focused, so a household that is out from morning to night is the wrong home for it. And they are hard to find here, which means waiting rather than choosing, and it means paying considerably more than for a common small breed.
Do Coton de Tulear dogs smell?
Not inherently, and when one does the cause is almost always findable. The usual culprit here is a coat that was washed and not dried all the way to the skin, which in this humidity turns into a damp layer next to the dog. Dry it properly and the problem generally goes with it.
Are Cotons hard to potty train?
No harder than other small breeds, and they are quick learners, which helps. What decides it is consistency rather than the breed. Choose the spot before the puppy arrives, do not move it, and accept that the first fortnight sets the pattern for the year.
How long do Coton de Tulears live?
Our own breed record gives 14–16 years, which is a long life even by small-dog standards. It is worth reading as the real commitment behind the purchase: you are deciding what happens to this animal for the better part of two decades, not for the next couple of years.
When can a Coton de Tulear puppy come home?
At about week 9. Core vaccinations are given at weeks 6 and 8 at the farm, with deworming at each visit, and homecoming follows about a week after the second dose. The third is due at week 12 with your own vet, and an optional fourth at week 16 if your vet advises it.