Do not buy a new vehicle to impress anyone.

Just my 2 cents. in addition you will not see the folks you describing owning any vehicles whatsoever LOL.. you need to be making good money to have car ownership and driving privileges in Singapore.

Too nice of a vehicle spells loan or lease payments, which spells their need for commissions is greater.

Can I do better passively in a hands-off fashion with other investment vehicles such as syndications in this market?

You can diversify into other investment vehicles.

They are selling their house next month that they have about 100K of equity in it, and are planning on paying off their vehicles (about $18K) and keeping the rest for a down payment on a house eventually, but are not planning on buying a house again until they can improve their credit. 

Meanwhile the property is locked up.The property has been vacant for a bit after the bank foreclosed on it, so the neighbors all know it's vacant.While rehabbing I started talking to the neighbors and had their contact information to contact me in case of emergency.I was told that for over a week now a vehicle would come and park on my driveway.  

If the student has a vehicle, their looking for lower rent.

I also wanted to touch on many larger investors being somewhat immune to problems ahead given that they are cash rich, but one of the main attractions that drew me to this podcast and forum is listening to the countless number of individuals tell their personal stories about how they were able to use RE as a vehicle to accumulate wealth and escape their somewhat miserable employment situations and build freedom for themselves.

Despite what everyone says it never made much sense to me because when you invest in that vehicle you are stuck with only garbage options.