Car appreciation... the aesthetics, the engineering, etc

Lease / used math (ish)

If I lease a new Superb (or other barge) it will cost me about £18k over four years. Yeah.

If I buy a used one for about £12-£18k, it will still be worth 'something' at the end of four years, assuming I'm not doing 100k miles a year (I'm not). Maybe I'll spend a bit more on maintenance, but if I'm lucky it shouldn't be a black hole for cash.

What could I get back at the end? £4-6k, assuming whatever powers it hasn't been found to be doubly / tripply cancer / global warming inducing?

Anything else I need to consider?

You may want to consider buying additional warranty with a used one, especially if it's a DSG equipped car.

Good luck getting through four years on a second hand car without at least one or two significant maintenance bills.

Hmm, VAG cars, second hand... New brakes all round, potential water pump replacement. Leaky valve covers. Egr valve issues. I wouldn't let that put you off as it applies to other makes too. But they are common large expenses that people avoid doing by selling the car.

Yeah that's not unreasonable, it depends on the age and history of the car though - I was shitting myself thinking the Passat I bought would need a timing belt at 60k but a lot of the VW stuff has long life servicing now and it won't need one for nearly double that.

I guess you do have to factor in things going wrong - we needed to replace the rear pads in it after my wife driving it for a year, to which the service manager asked me "Who is she, Ken Block?"

I had a 2nd hand Passat for about 7 years.

As far as I recall, all that went wrong with it was a coolant hose burst.

It's a sample size of 1, so pretty irrelevant, but more went wrong with the Mondeo we had before that.

I’m saying nothing.

I would hope some of the additional cost of repairs would be offset vs. lease by not having to go nuts on bodywork / paint repair when some prick scrapes your motor when it’s parked in the street outside your house :/

Good info though thanks :)

also have a look at PCP. The Superb cost me roughly £20k over the 4 years, and then paid off the finance for just under £11k at the end.

The car was still worth more than the finance and it spreads out the pain a bit. Equivalent deal now would be a bit more as the list price has gone up a chunk.

This is how I bought my last Skoda too, and ended up in a similar situation.

I'd really like a Volvo wagon next.

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Surley if you buy 2nd hand you keep for more than 4 years. As you'll knownits a good car and run it into ground.
Thats when the maths then works good.

Exactly.

You should be able to do 150k in a modern car. A quick look says Howard should be able to get something with 50k for his money. 10k pa means another 10yrs out of it.

Also I'll just repost this classic
https://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2011/04/19/how-to-come-out-way-ahead-when-buying-a-used-car/

this is the way

New old stock ftw.

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Thanks @skinny and @hugo7

to @hoops @TRA 's points, if you buy a modern car with say 40k miles on it, what should you plan and budget to replace over the next 40k miles and what are we talking about in £?

I bought my E Class on 42,000 miles, sold it at 52,000.

In that time, major battery and minor battery (~£1,300), drivers side adaptive damper (£700), four tyres (£980), Service B (oil and filters) (£400).

4.55 litres in one UK Gallon, ~10,000 miles driven at 22mpg means 10,000/22*4.55*£1.60=£3,500 on fuel.

Bought it for £28,500, sold it for £26,500, so total costs were:

Depreciation £2,000
Servicing and repairs £3,380
Fuel £3,500
Insurance £650
VED £550
Total £10,080 for a year in an E63.

When you say paid off the finance, does that mean you had to pay 11k at the end so 31k over 4 years and you kept the car afterwards?

I had a browse on Autotrader - is it worth looking a newer car from a less fashionable brand? You can get a 20k mile 2019 Insignia estate for similar money to a 2017 Superb getting on for 40k miles - gives you 20k 'free' driving?

Obviously anything other than buying new and keeping forever, or bangernomics, is hard to justify from a pure financial perspective. Just do what feels best and don't worry about the cost too much maybe?

Sold my car on Motorway today. 2015 Mitsubishi Shogun, bought on 29k miles sold on 39k

bought Feb 2021 for £20k
one big service for £800
3 new tyres say £400
Insurance = £300
VED=£550
10,000 miles at say 30 MPG means 10,000/30*4.5 *1.60= £2,400 on fuel

Sold for £20,300 =
£4,150 for the year

It's so hard to say.

I hesitate to reference my own car, but it's just needed servicing from ~35k to ~50k. It has DSG so I spent a bit more on a major service to make sure the oil was changed but nothing else. In my MINI that my folks now have the clutch (iirc) went. From BMW that was ~£2.5k. I'm sure you could get that cheaper from an indy. It's also had a new battery which again was reassuringly expensive from BMW.

With the wealth of info online now, you can usually find out about thinks like the Mini clutch, or timing chains, etc. I feel like most of these big bills are around £2k and you should expect 1 or 2.

Goes without saying that cars like Mercs or BWMs are going to cost a lot to repair just from a parts pov.

is hard to justify from a pure financial perspective. Just do what feels best and don't worry about the cost too much maybe?

There is also that.

I swear pistonheads is some sort of sociology experiment in man-maths. The number of posts that could be shortened to; "I want it and have worked out a way to pay for it".

Last car was a 2015 Seat Ibiza

Bought Feb 19 for £8k on 19k miles, traded in Dec 21 for £5k at 46k

Depreciation £3k
4 tyres £300
3 services & MOTs £600
New front discs + pads £150
Blew a heating resistor =£100
Insurance £800
Tax £90
27k miles at 45mpg = £4k.

Just over £3k a year despite 'only' £1k a year depreciation. 35p a mile. Cars are expensive (and yet also, cheap).

Edit - a £300 a month new car lease with no servicing costs would be about 58p a mile, £200 a month would have been 44p.

does that mean you had to pay 11k at the end so 31k over 4 years and you kept the car afterwards?

Yes, exactly so.

At the end of the PCP deal, you have the option to hand the car back (potentially having an argument over cuts and scratches and the residual value of the car in the process), or pay off the "balloon payment" of the outstanding finance and keep your car - in which case the dealer doesn't care about what condition it is in.

The way PCP is structured is that you buy the whole car at the start with a loan for the whole cost minus deposit, and pay off a certain amount of the loan over the course of the contract term. If you give the car back, the dealer settles the outstanding finance on your behalf.