We bought our 1993 Toyota Lucida for £800 a couple of years ago. It's brill. Fetch the seats out the back and you can (just about) fit two motorcycles and trackday gear in there, plus we don't worry about it getting dirty so it's also ace for slinging manky bicycles in too 😀 We also couldn't give two hoots what other people think about us and everything we have is all old but is paid for in full. I sleep very well.
My car cost about about 7% of my annual income.
However, I have the same amount as I earn in a year in the bank in savings.
I also have no debts and own my own home and everything in it outright.
FWIW, my monthly outgoings (utilities, council tax, mobile phone etc) are about 20% of my income after tax.
I also only work 2 days a week.
I've been pondering this too of late as all of the roads near me seem full of expensive brand new shiny shiny cars of German origin.
I can understand how people can afford £200/£300 a month on PCP repayments but usually you're required to stuff a huge wedge of cash down as a deposit aren't you? I can't imagine comfortable stuffing £5k in a dealer's top pocket only to have the privilege of then making 48 monthly payments.
I earn a reasonable wage as does the wife who works part time, however I can't ever imagine being able to afford a new X5/ Audi A6 / E Class etc etc
Mine cost me about 2 months take home salary, could have spent more but I liked the car and I like the fact that it left me with enough from my budget to keep it on the road for years or to replace it in a hurry. I've no use for a new car tbh, any car I own ends up mauled by bikes and mud and trailbuilding so I bought a scabby one I didn't mind ruining.
Still, the running costs are enough that if I didn't ride bikes, I'd probably not own a car
As others have said it is about affordability. Society has changed over the last decade or so and we are becoming more inclined to rent (or pay a subscription) rather than own. We pay monthly for Netflicks, we rent Boris bikes as we use them, we rent power tools etc. The UK is the exception but in the rest of Europe people tend to rent property rather than buy it. This is what is now happening in the motor industry.
Last year there were approximately 2.3 million new cars registered in the UK. About 50% of these were Company cars and the other 50% to retail customers. 80% of people who buy a new car use somebody else's money (i.e. Mostly dealer finance but some people get personal loans). I certainly couldn't afford to walk into a dealer and handover £20,000 and if I did I certainly wouldn't want to invest it in a depreciating asset.
The car manufacturers have to sell cars and clearly 80% of us couldn't buy one for cash. So they offer PCP to make the vehicle affordable. You pay say a 10% deposit, they set a Guaranteed Future Value and then you pay the difference between the deposit and future value (plus interest) back over two or three years. This works for the manufacturers because at the end of the term you either pay off the future value and keep the car or you order a new car using the equity as a deposit and you start over again. It's also great for the dealers as they sell a new car every two or three years and it gives them a steady supply to good quality used car stock.
This is so important now that the manufacturers now target the dealers on the number of customers they retain or renew, as it is clearly cheaper to keep an existing customer than it is to get a new customer. Many dealers now employ Loyalty Specialists/Managers, whose job it is, is to identify when it is the optimum time to change and then call the customer (They use equity software). When they identity that you can change for a similar monthly payment and no additional deposit (apart from the equity), the will contact the customer to tell them that they can upgrade. A bit like the mobile phone companies do.
Both our cars are on finance, and comes out about 14% of our net annual income. However that in itself doesnt mean much, its all about how much disposable income you have.
Both cars are less than 1.5 years old. If we had bought both out right it would have been about 106% of our net annual income.
To answer the OP, it's either finance or PCP that allows people to have new cars. How they can rationally spend that amount of money each month on something that they never own I'm not sure.
My current car is 15 years old. I bought it 10 years ago as a well looked after low milage old mans car. Bank loan to pay for it, which was about 25% of my then gross pay. 😯 At the time I got a low interest rate and paid back very little interest over the 5 year term. I service it myself and generally look after it. It's only worth a token amount now, but it's reliable, comfortable and has done everything I've asked it to do. This year's MOT was it's first failure. But the bill to put it back on the road was £220 including the MOT. It was something I couldn't do myself. It's been cheap motoring for 10 years, but it's now heading towards bigger bills.
In contrast my BIL bought a Polo on finance in 2004. Swapped it for another 12 months later. Paid the finance for 48 months and then re-mortaged and used some extra capital to pay off the car finance! It cost him just shy of £11 in all. Kept it 12 months and then used it as a deposit on a new Polo on PCP. They gave him £2.5k for it. He's now on the second PCP, first one handed back after 3 years, and took out another. It's about 18 months in to the term now. With the monthly payments he will have paid £22k to buy the first car, trade it in and then "rent" a car over 12 years. And still not own a car at the end. The PCP is like an unbreakable drug addiction.
P-JayIf I had to give that up for whatever reason I'd probably lease something, I think you could get a Panda Trekking for about £180 a month, which is what it would cost you to borrow £5000 over 3 years if you wanted to buy something and didn't have the cash. less than 10% of my income.
That makes no sense at all, IMO. "Rent" it for 3 years or buy something similar for the same money but then own a car that would be reasonably worth £2.5k?
How they can rationally spend that amount of money each month on something that they never own I'm not sure.
Its very easy. Ive got a BMW. If I saved the £330 per month that it costs me it would take me 8.5 years to save to go and buy the car. This means that I would be without a car for 8.5 years whilst saving, and therefore would be unable to do my job.
Also if I saved for 8.5 years, hand over the cash, I would have lost probably £10k there and then driving it from the Garage.
I currently get to drive a brand new car that I couldnt afford any other way, I have fixed out goings per month, and I can budget for the next 2 years.
All cars are money pits regardless. Its just all about how you want to budget for it.
That makes no sense at all, IMO. "Rent" it for 3 years or buy something similar for the same money but then own a car that would be reasonably worth £2.5k?
That makes no sense given my example above. Plus my £330 per month over 2 years would give me £8k, which will not buy a half decent new car. So I would have to buy 2nd hand and then have to pay for MOT's, bills etc etc, and end up driving around in an older car, all for the same money per month.
Yay, my Nissan Micra Tempest 52 plate passed it's MOT again this morning, 😀 no advisories. Another year of cheap motoring.
If it depreciates, rent it. If it appreciates but it - isn't that the general rule?
FunkyDunc
My point was [b][i][u]I[/u][/i][/b] don't understand how someone, anyone, [b][i][u]YOU[/u][/i][/b] can rationally spend that sort of money. I don't hold the same value in driving around in a new car as you do. To me it's a tool, it gets me to work and back in comfort, gets the family were it needs to go, etc.
How you rationalise it is up to you. You like to have the car you have, and are obivously happy to pay for that. I would rather spend my money on experiences with my family that will last a lifetime, the destination and the experience rather that the journey. 😉
I certainly couldn't afford to walk into a dealer and handover £20,000 and if I did I certainly wouldn't want to invest it in a depreciating asset.
But are you quite happy to pay £24000 on a car loan including interest for the same depreciating asset?
Pal at work had a really nice car, loved driving around on a Friday night. Later in life I found out the reason he wasn't in the pub having a few beers was that he could just about afford spare cash to put some petrol in his fancy car, but nothing else.
It's just what you are comfortable paying for, I don't think you can apply a hard and fast 10% max income level for a car - if you're tooled up with a mortage, kids at private school and that middle management post doesn't mean you've got anymore 'spare cash' than the guy flipping burger at MacDonalds for a car.
Just did some Google'ing and apparently the average price of a new car is about the same as the average yearly gross salary, ie about 26-27K. I realise that that doesn't mean that everyone spends all their money on cars, but still ... can't get my head around it.
My point was I don't understand how someone, anyone, YOU can rationally spend that sort of money
I would rather spend my money on experiences with my family that will last a lifetime, the destination and the experience rather that the journey
...and this is where it is all about how much disposable income you have to spend on things. In the past I havent been able to afford a car, now I can afford a fairly nice one. Some people can afford a nicer one than me, probably because they earn more than me.
It comes down to priorities...i have a crappy car because i spend my money on bicycles, other sports and i change my motorcycle every 2-3 years...the other half and i also enjoy eating out quite a bit....and we have two dogs which are over indulged i reckon!
If you dont have any hobbies and spend most evenings sat on the sofa watching TV then somebody else with my same salary will probably drive a far nicer car than i do!
Personally i couldnt give a toss about my car, i love watching TopGear and like hearing fast cars and bikes on the road but i cant bring myself to spend good money on cars as driving them doesnt bring me any pleasure whereas cocking about on two wheels does give me a buzz....and thats what it comes down to, i dont like spending money on stuff that i dont enjoy and i've got no interest in playing 'keeping up with the Joneses' over something that ultimately loses value.
8.8 year old C-max, serviced myself, paid for with cash 4 years ago, will probably do another 3 years before I even think about changing it, probably for something similar.
Would I like a A6 estate on finance, yup, it'd be a much nicer car, but a the minute this one's fine.
Relative to all the other costs of owning it* £200 a month to drive arround in something that was actualy nice wouldn't be too bad.
£2k/year in fuel, £400 insurance, £200 tax, £50 MOT, £75 service, £150 tyres + sundries like sceenwash, de-icer, air freshner, washing etc is already north of £240 a month before you look at depreciation which even on my car is probably £70 a month. So if you're already paying all that, why not pay a bit more and do it in something nice.
Bought my current car as an ex demo 9 years ago and at that time it cost me (after trade in) approximately 20% of my annual salary. Used a bank loan to pay for it over 3 years so for the last 6 years it's cost next to nowt. No need or desire to sell it for the foreseeable future.
I do love these threads. They're all about personal values, judgement of others and a certain self righteousness in our own insecurities.
If we want to get down to the hard facts, it might be easier to do a calculation of the annual cost of owning and running a car against annual take home income. Expressed as a percentage.
Using the following categories (apols if I've missed anything obvious)
Depreciation (mine's paid for, so there's no additional purchase cost)
Servicing
Tax
Insurance
Fuel
Tyres
Misc
Back of a fag packet - my car this year will cost 11% of my annual net income. Which I consider to be rather high. The biggest single cost (over 50%) is fuel....
(Of course, that's not truly accurate as it should really be worked out across the life of the car and include purchase costs.)
As others have said it is about affordability. Society has changed over the last decade or so and we are becoming more inclined to rent (or pay a subscription) rather than own.
A reason for that shift might be lot of the other things people spend money on, that were traditionally quite big-ticket investments have gotten cheaper. I don't think its even possible to rent a TV these days, let alone a VCR. Things like your sofa, washing machine and so on would often be big investments and have to be on HP too. So the idea of effectively renting a car that would otherwise be beyond your means is perhaps a result of having fewer of those monthly bills to meet and one big commitment being easier to organise than lots of small ones.
Did not read all the threads ...
I bought my 2005 Toyota Corolla 1.6 auto gear 24k on the clock, for £5k about 5 years ago. Road tax is £260 per year. Insurance after 5 years is £495 coming down from nearly £2K plus in the first year. Normally, MOT is around £30 for me. Car has full service once so cost me £670. The only thing I would "modify" is to change the coil spring to something harder and get my mate, impossible as he is other part of the world, to tune it for me.
Apart from the above I just pump in petrol and drive ... checking everything before that. i.e. tyres, tyre pressure, water, coolant, engine oil, brake oil etc ...
I drive it once in a while and so far managed about 3k miles every year as I don't have the time to drive around too often. Fuel is not a problem for me as a full tank will last me several months ... I need to drive more ... arrgghh ...
😀
I see a car as an expense rather than an asset.
I personally quite like cars and I choose them based on what I can afford (and want to spend) monthly - I always use PCP type deals and prefer new for a hassle free life.
Currently pay about 7% of my gross towards a car payments.
I am not saying it is the cheapest way to do it, but it is my approach.
What's the point of a really nice flash new car, if when you climb out of it your an obese bag of sh*te. I prefer my own bodywork to look good.
In cash terms, my current car cost me about ¼ of my monthly take home pay.
It was slightly more complicated than that as it was a part-exchange and the two cars were very close in value (I wanted something bigger so traded in a supermini for a Berlingo). But the old car was bought for “part cash/part loan” (cost would have been between ¼ - 1/5 of my annual income that year) and the loan had been paid off by a couple of years by then. So that’s all I’ve paid in the last 4 years or so other than running costs. And those aren’t bad considering I don’t drive it much and it’s sailed through the last 2 MOTs needing nothing more than a new bulb or two.
Even if you take what I paid for the first car plus what I paid for the second car and divide it by the time since I bought the first car I’m down to about £125 per month, and that assumes that my current car has no value whatsoever. And that’s with the first car being bought new so suffering heavier depreciation. My next car will almost certainly be a second hand car bought with cash. Probably another Berlingo. I have enough cash in the bank to cover that and I can’t see it being worth much more than 10% of my annual income.
I really don’t get cars as a status symbol. Fine, if you like driving or like cars I can understand spending money on your hobby. But just to show off how much money you have? I remember one of my trainees hating the job but still being desperate to qualify so she could buy a BMW. I’m not sure I even had a car at the time (I spent a year or so experimenting with living without a car). It struck me as quite sad that she was so obsessed by material things rather than finding a job she actually enjoyed.
I don’t really drive enough to want something “nice to drive around in”. To be honest, I don’t like car culture and given I’m trying to cut down on driving miles in favour of other forms of transport it would be counter-productive to have a nice car that I wanted to drive! I eventually decided that a car was useful enough to have one, but not to spend stupid amounts of money on or get obsessed about. I think today is the first time I’ve used the car since last Tuesday.Having something that looks out of place in the office car park encourages me to cycle to work more often 😉 Similarly, something cheap stops me thinking “I’m paying so much for it that I may as well use it”.
This means that I would be without a car for 8.5 years whilst saving, and therefore would be unable to do my job.
Or you buy a cheaper car and still do your job...?
I want to go on holiday 3 times a year,
aside from the fact that I don't get enough time off work to do that, that sounds to me like the same kind of madness that most of the posters on here think is involved in having a car 😉
I'm 50 next week and I can count my foreign holidays on the fingers of both hands, not including the thumbs. lot of money for something you quickly forget (well, that I quickly forget, anyway).
I bought a brand new car with cash (debit card) from a BMW dealer last year it was >50% of my gross salary! Was an odd feeling typing my pin in for that one. I like fast cars and have always been a bit of a petrol head really.
I'm sure I will be judged for both of these statements now!
Never pay more than £500 quid for a car, keep it small and economical, and never claim on the insurance for anything. Try to do most work on it myself, but if it seriously breaks or gets pinched: repeat.
Im awaiting my brand new Octavia vRS, petrol of course :D, and Im getting it on PCP.
Im a bit of a petrol head and Im looking forward to having a bit of poke about it rather than my rather tired 135k miles V70 D5 Ive had for the past 8 years. Mortgage will be paid off in a couple of months so Im looking forward to spending some cash on a nice motor and see something for my money (divorce got me the mortgage, I`d already paid one off!)
I've got a Mercedes C Class that I bought brand new in 2007. It cost £38k so about 75% of my annual salary, I paid cash for it. I've driven just under 100k miles and it has been faultless and totally reliable. I like cars and enjoy driving them and it's reasuring to know that I can jump in it and drive to the south of France and not have to be worried about it breaking down like I would in an old beater.
Looking to sell it soon and spend about £40k in cash on my next car. Depretiation doesn't bother me, it's just a cost of ownership.
why does my font change all the time!!
I've just bought a brand new Toyota MPV (well, deposit paid, balance sat waiting for delivery). I got 20% off the list price, and used some savings plus a low interest personal loan for the balance. This will cost me less per month than leasing would have, and once the loan is paid off I'll have it for £0 per month for the second half of its life. (My current cars are a 11yr old Fiesta, owned since new, and a 10yr old Zafira, owned since 4yrs old, both on 125,000 miles, so I would hope that the Toyota should last at least ten years too - if a Ford and a Vauxhall can it bloody well better). I'm sure bangernomics could work out cheaper, but assuming it lasts at least ten years then that averages out at costing me about 4% of our net income, 8% if I only keep it for five, but I won't. I can live with that.
Brought my 99 pug 306 estate 10 years ago for 4k. 120000 miles later and it's still going strong albeit a bit louder that it used to.
[quote=biglee1 ]why does my font change all the time!!
You're using the wrong symbol between I and m for I'm
I changed from an older car (7 year old Audi) that was worryingly close to landing me a big bill to a brand new Octavia on a PCP deal. The cost of the repayments on the personal loan for the Audi are the same as the payments on the Skoda. I like the fact I have peace of mind on one of the family cars. It came with 3 years free servicing, it is covered by a warranty, the road tax is £200 a year less than the Audi and it is a lot more frugal.
The payments would be around 7% of my net monthly salary. At the end of the deal I will probably hand it back and get something similar.
I've got a 10 year old subaru, which does everything very well (including drinking petrol) and is worth about the same as one terms school fees
My last car was £300 a month inc full servicing (2 year PCP - would have been cheaper over 3 or 4), £0 road tax,cheap to insurance (relative for me <400 a year), did 62mpg over the time I had it. £1000 down at the start.
Faultless pain free quality motoring. That is the cost of new BMW ownership.
I've done the bangernomics and the new car route, depends on what suits at the time! Both options have their plus and minuses.
Ignoring student cars, the first time I had the option of new or cheap I bought my dad's old '96 Corsa off him as I knew the history of it and he was happy with a few more quid than the pathetic trade-in price he was offered. £1500 for a car that lasted 3 years and did 40k rattling round all over the place with bikes, mates and random stuff. I only got rid of it as I had changed jobs to working in a bank and it was made clear that my car was not exactly the right image they wanted to portray (Compomotive alloys, the odd bit of rust and 50 shades of Vauxhall's finest red 8) )so I sold it on for £560 (spent it on bike bits) and bought a pre-reg Ka for £5k on a straight loan. Was paranoid about it not lasting enough for me to pay for it so for the winter months I bought an Audi 80 for £52.12 and used that. Wound the boss up by saying I was bringing the Audi tomorrow, his face was priceless when I turned up in a scabby '84 silver box with rally spots 😆 That thing lasted me 2 winters without spending anything more than MOT and tax on it before it blew the radiator so it was scrapped.
Traded the Ka in for a Fiesta as it was getting on a bit and wish I never had. Hated that car! The trouble was I was stuck with it due to the finance so it stayed with me for 9 years! Once the loan was paid off it had entered into bangernomics so I just kept it going without really caring for it (I'd changed jobs by now so image was no longer a problem). Got rid of it last year as the suspension all needed replacing for the MOT so looked around for a replacement. Was going to go for a cheap car (~£2k) but a timely PPI refund arrived so I was able to treat myself to a new Fabia whilst only taking £3k on finance which will be paid off in two years, the car should still have plenty of life in it by then hopefully! I'll be keeping it for a good 8-10 years so it made sense. After that it will be cheap cars unless I have the cash to buy outright for something special. I see too many of my friends struggle to afford their mortgage and car payments while bringing up a family to put myself in that position!
2001 audi tdi bought 5 yrs ago for £2000 just coming up to 100k on the clock gets serviced once a year will keep it until something catastrophic happens to it!!
[i]ericemel - Member
I see a car as an expense rather than an asset.
I personally quite like cars and I choose them based on what I can afford (and want to spend) monthly - I always use PCP type deals and prefer new for a hassle free life.
Currently pay about 7% of my gross towards a car payments.
I am not saying it is the cheapest way to do it, but it is my approach.[/i]
This ^^.
So can someone tell me if I'm being an idiot or not with this decision:
Currently earn around 25k, and I'm 25 years old.
I save a minimum of £500 a month into ISA, and a maximum to date of £1000. Usually it's around £700. Depends on how much I party and treat myself, but I'm getting more and more over material things so generally the trend is upwards.
I'm considering buying a VW Scirocco for around £10k. 2.0L GT diesel variant if I can, 2010 latest. I intend to keep it minimum 5 years.
Is this absolutely nuts? That's almost 50% of my annual, but I have the cash. Or rather I will do in about 3 months or so, depending on how good I am + my current cars estimated £1k part ex.
This will, of course, empty my savings. But I live at home and no kids. So yeah. Insane or?
Would I be better off financing and keeping 5ish grand toward a mortgage?
My Volvo now 2% of my income (bought at 20% of mine)
Wifes Volvo 20% of wifes income (bought at 30% of hers)
I am a proponent of buy and run it until the scrappy, although this may be feasible as I do a lot of maintenance and repairs myself.
Volvos because I do a lot of maintenance and repairs myself - everywhere I stick my nose I find quality and nicely engineered solutions.
Well, I'm going to stick my head above the parapet and rebel against the bangernomics in the thread.
I like cars (and bikes, and motorbikes) so I want a nice motor on the drive, and I'm lucky enough to earn a decent wage.
My car is a new Merc with a list of 45% of my gross salary, and my wife's is a new Mazda with a list of 25% of my gross. I'm sole earner.
On one level, that seems like I've spent nearly all my money, but appearances are deceptive.
The Merc is a company car, so despite being a top of the range spangly one, all I pay is BIK. In two years, I'll get a new one. The Mazda is on 3 years 0% finance, because the money is better in my bank account than Mazda's. We'll be keeping it for 10 years.
So in the end, 25% of my net salary pays the mortgage, 35% of it pays all the bills. and the rest is 'disposable'. And I appear to be (am? 🙂 ) a flash git with two brand new cars on the drive.
I work hard, have a good education, and work in an industry that pays well, so I get to benefit with nice toys.
My car is about 1/40th of my salary. Its shit.
Paid £750 for mine 3 years ago. It's probably still worth that now... I reckon I'm quids in. Personally I find it a shame that old cars are scrapped so soon, but they've become disposable items to most people. I enjoy looking after and maintaining them though.
Got to factor in the running costs as well. Some very economical newer cars out there now.
I have a 435d which is part if my salary package. It's list price was a tad under my salary from my main job.
I own a 2003 celica which I bought years ago and can't bear to part with. I have a CRV I paid cash for (£5k) for transporting boxing stuff, bikes, dogs. I love cars.
For me it's all down to what you can afford and whether or not you're prepared to pay it, whether that's monthly or as a lump sum.
I just went through looking at changing my almost 5 year old A3 for a new 3 Series and although I can comfortably afford the monthly repayments on the new car, I couldn't actually bring myself to do it as something was telling me it was a waste of money and I should just live with the Audi even though I hate driving it as it's the most boring car I've ever sat behind the wheel of.
Edit: I wish I just kept my bloody Type R
plyphon - If was 25 and living at the parents I would not spend 10k on a car, i'd either be doing everything in my power to get my own place in the UK or i'd be in Canada/NZ etc. riding my bike as much as possible.
If you want a Scirocco, spend 1 to 2 k on a decent one, the badge on the back should say Corrado. 😉
Hmmm.
But surely once you have your own place the ability to buy a car is diminished by quite a fair bit?
I've already done a bit of Aus and NZ. I'm still not sure about settling in the UK - hence the car over house preference!
Any more thoughts?
I can't stomach the depreciation on newer cars, generally buy something older and well looked after.
Seems barmy to me that you'd rent a car for 3 years, being careful not to go over the mileage or get any stone chips then give it back and start again!
bought my boxter 2nd hand for cash. the money id spend on leasing instead goes into a slushfund to keep it running. £3k worth of repairs since i bought it, only done 500 miles. Luckily its all been fixed under warranty so far.
makes a nice noise though...
I'm considering buying a VW Scirocco for around £10k. 2.0L GT diesel variant if I can, 2010 latest. I intend to keep it minimum 5 years.
Nuts? Only the diesel bit, I have a nice petrol one with DSG box within your budget. 😉
My last car (bought last May) was 1/140th of my gross salary. Will probably try and flog it sometime in next couple of months and then purchase something around 1/50th of my salary. Have just bought a house (12 months ago) and would rather have cash to spend on house than worry about a car I use 2 or three times a week.
'plyphon - Member
So can someone tell me if I'm being an idiot or not with this decision:Currently earn around 25k, and I'm 25 years old.
I save a minimum of £500 a month into ISA, and a maximum to date of £1000. Usually it's around £700. Depends on how much I party and treat myself, but I'm getting more and more over material things so generally the trend is upwards.
I'm considering buying a VW Scirocco for around £10k. 2.0L GT diesel variant if I can, 2010 latest. I intend to keep it minimum 5 years.
Is this absolutely nuts? That's almost 50% of my annual, but I have the cash. Or rather I will do in about 3 months or so, depending on how good I am + my current cars estimated £1k part ex.
This will, of course, empty my savings. But I live at home and no kids. So yeah. Insane or?
Would I be better off financing and keeping 5ish grand toward a mortgage?
Nah at your age just enjoy yourself. I had a similar wage at your age but didn't save any money - my 20's were spend on rent and pissing it up the wall. I bought a new car at age 25, kept it a few years, would never do it again but don't regret it. As the other poster says - get a petrol unless you're doing over 15k a year.
I have a 435d which is part if my salary package.
That's a fairly bizarre car to be given for work purposes?
What do you do, drive small parcels around the country very quickly?
3 years ago I bought a 500 pound BMW 530i from 1989 it is still going and is the best car I have ever owned all though all I had is chryslers old BMW 5 series. I will not buy anything new now. In fact I am sticking to cars pre 1990 as I think car design got dull after that with a few exceptions.
Shiny new fast BMW here on lease.
It was a cheap deal, payments are less than 1% of what it would have cost to buy, and I can just give it back after 2 years. In that time, I pay for one minor service and possibly a pair of rear tyres - lease co even pay the VED. I don't think it will cost me any more than the Fabia or Civic (both bought at 6 months old) I had before it.
Less about predictable expense, more than I don't have the time or inclination to be dropping a car off every other month for MOT, or to get something else fixed, or spend my weekends under it. Have done old and cheap(ish) before, it was great when I was single, time-rich, worked locally and had a good mechanic down the road for things I couldn't manage myself.
Most of my mileage is for work, they pay business mileage pretty generously. I don't have a "commute" to pay for out of my own pocket (even when I cycle it's at 20p/mile). Not going into percentages, it's not an amount I lose down the sofa but not a huge dent in our household budget. We only run the one car between us too.
On the flipside, I've never spent more than £900 on a bike (actually, have never bought a "current year" bike either), because I've rarely felt that my enjoyment would be massively improved by spending more.
Really depends how many miles you do. And if you give a shit about what you drive.
We have positioned ourself so that kids walk to school on their own and we both cycle to work.
We were lucky (??!) to inherit an 05 plate 307sw which does about about 20 miles per week in commuting/ferrying kids about bu in the warmer months takes us away 2 or 3 weekends each month. Very occasionally I need to work out of city for a day so may do a 100 mile each way trip.
When driven 'steadily' it will do 60+mpg on long runs and costs 300-500 per year to mot and service. It's a shed inside and out. We could afford to buy and run a 'nice car' but we'd only see any point. It's an F'ing metal box that takes you places to do cool stuff. The money we save on not using the super shed on wheels much is saved in the campervan account...
If I needed a car to drive a lot if miles in now I'd look to spend <£3k on a mid size diesel estate with a decent history. Just don't see that anything more expensive gets you anything other than posing potential.
If you like driving and are happy to spend your money on another hobby then go for it
Edited as kinda agree with subsequent post..
This turned into a d1ck swinging contest pretty quickly.
£500 car per year. Recoup £50 scrap value when it fails the mot. Repeat
This turned into a d1ck swinging contest pretty quickly.
MPV owners have the swingingest dicks. Fact. Especially those with 2 MPVs.
*licks finger, smooths down eyebrows*
cheers_drive - Member
'plyphon - Member
So can someone tell me if I'm being an idiot or not with this decision:
Currently earn around 25k, and I'm 25 years old.
I save a minimum of £500 a month into ISA, and a maximum to date of £1000. Usually it's around £700. Depends on how much I party and treat myself, but I'm getting more and more over material things so generally the trend is upwards.
I'm considering buying a VW Scirocco for around £10k. 2.0L GT diesel variant if I can, 2010 latest. I intend to keep it minimum 5 years.
Is this absolutely nuts? That's almost 50% of my annual, but I have the cash. Or rather I will do in about 3 months or so, depending on how good I am + my current cars estimated £1k part ex.
This will, of course, empty my savings. But I live at home and no kids. So yeah. Insane or?
Would I be better off financing and keeping 5ish grand toward a mortgage?Nah at your age just enjoy yourself. I had a similar wage at your age but didn't save any money - my 20's were spend on rent and pissing it up the wall. I bought a new car at age 25, kept it a few years, would never do it again but don't regret it. As the other poster says - get a petrol unless you're doing over 15k a year.
POSTED 1 HOUR AGO # REPORT-POST
Heh. Sounds good to me. I figure I'll still be able to get a deposit within a couple of years with my GF if I spend the 10k now.
I do about 13kish give or take. So on the edge I guess of petrol/diesel . Of course tax is more on petrol also I believe. But I will consider petrol for sure. Extra bhp init
Part exchanged my old one and got a loan for the remainder of the new one. I pay about £200 a month for the loan. It's worth it for having a nice new car which is way more efficient than the old one, I probably end up spending the same as I used to as it's offset by the improved efficiency.
4 cars. Couple of classics, 60's mini, type 2 bay window camper. Old Alfa bought at 4 yrs old for £9k done 120k+ miles worth maybe a grand. Daily is a merc clk bought at 4yrs old for circa 15k Work on a basis of 2.5 per annum depreciation on the fleet. Works for me.
As a percentage of my income, well that's mine to know but its quite quite manageable.
bought our 57 plate altea xl for £4k last year. absolutely gutted to have paid so much tbh, had ratty looking escort/partner vans and a focus before which never let us down and cheap to run - prob combined value when i bought them of £4k over 10 years! don't understand why people want to pay £300+ a month just to have something shiny parked outside, but each to their own
we have a camper too which we've had about 5 years, cost us about £6k inc subsequent subaru engine replacement 2 years ago and fitting it out myself with ikea/smev stuff. so working out about £1k a year plus mot/tax/insurance its best thing we've ever bought
When I used to work in Edinburgh I got the bus everywhere and didn't need a car. When my employer relocated to Sunderland, my gran gave me her '05 Panda as she was giving up driving due to her age.
I used that with enthusiasm for 18 months until it got written off (my fault), but spent the payout on a newer 09 model which featured a 12v socket so was a good upgrade!! 🙂 It suits me as it's cheap to run, tax and insure, and as the ride height is better than a normal car, means when I go to film rallies and drive through forests before and after ~100 rally cars have ripped the roads to shreds it's less likely to rip the floor off or get stuck. I've done 25k miles in 10 months and it's never let me down, and only had a basic service and MOT.
I do have a personal reg which I need an 11 plate car to use it, so that's the only reason I'd change but would have to be a decent small and above all reliable replacement. Would have to save up though, couldn't face getting a car on credit but can see why others do, not an issue to me.
I would pcp/rent/finance a shiny car if it was a money making tool for me..... It isnt
So our cars were bought at 3 and 10 years old for roughly 4 and 2% of my wage.... Cheap cars
Put 200 quid a side each month for running costs and seem to opperate a surplus- but then i do all my own maintainance so not too pricy
How do people afford cars? By not spending the car money on other things I guess. That's how it is for me. And why I've avoided getting a newer car since I got my current one just under 12 years ago.
Mine's now a 120,000+ miler from 2002. It was our second car after about 5 years of me not having one. Thinking back, it probably cost about 50% of my net annual wage at the time (yikes!). I used a personal loan to cover about 80% of the car's cost. Over the past 5 years I figure it has cost about £500/year in parts/servicing.
I think it may be time to get something a bit more up to date. I'll likely go for a PCP-type deal to avoid dipping into savings and to keep the monthly cost down to something not too disruptive. Proportion of income? Up to 20% of disposable income in my 3 am imagination. That may go way down dependent on advice at home and my unwillingness to spend in the showroom. Thinking about it, maybe I should keep my current car and get a new bike instead. Or just save the money.
You know all these car crime statistics? Well someone has to benefit from all these thefts... 😉 just learn to steal a fancy car and you're sorted...
Ergo, I'm the proud owner of a Skoda Octavia TDI for the small sum of a few 'cracking' tools and 160 hours community service...
DrP
For the first time since 1999 I'm not a car owner.
I work from home, live in the middle of town so only need car on weekends. Based on the annual costs here in Oz I can hire a car every other weekend for less. So thats what I'm doing. I get what I want when I need it, don't worry about repairs or ongoing costs or having the wrong car for what I'm doing.
My car is x% of my salary.
Why would I reveal that? Reminds me of the poor STWer who was mauled by revealing he was on 50k and another slagged him off then revealed later on in the thread that he did as little work as possible as did his partner.
No ta.
Hora - but we all know you have more money than anyone here given how often you change bikes. I simply couldn't afford to change bikes as often as you do 🙂
peterfile - Member
That's a fairly bizarre car to be given for work purposes?
What do you do, drive small parcels around the country very quickly?
POSTED 10 HOURS AGO #
I work in design/branding. Apologises if this came over as willy swinging in anyway, I'm very humble in real life and often look at what I have and think how did I get here from colouring stuff in.
Never really thought about our car as a percentage of income....it's not much really as it was only £7k bought with a bank loan. It represented great value for money (E90 339) and has so far been ok; one minor repair to the VANOS. A set of tyres and tax. My car is a company car so costs my BIK plus £10 per month damage waiver.
You can get some really nice cars for not too much cash...anything slightly older with a few miles on the clock and people believe that it'll automatically rape your wallet. They then go and PCP a new / nearly new car and get raped on depreciation and finance costs. One of my mates who seems obsessed with having something shiney and newish tried to tell me that depreciation isn't a cost. Hmmm.
To be honest I don't think many actually buy a car these days. The majority are leased or PCP'd. The latter is a great way to get a new car cheaply, but it traps you in an endless cycle of finance and upgrades.
Willy waving goes both ways - people can be proud of how little they spend or what they can afford. Nothing wrong with either view, people have different values and interests.
Car purchase chain :
At 16K salary, bought a £1K car. Kept for a couple of years.
£3K loan + savings, £5K car. Kept for 3 years.
Trade in + savings, £11K car. Kept for a year.
Sale + savings + share scheme money, £19K car (new!). Kept for 5 years.
Sale + savings, £13K car. Kept for 5 years.
Trade in + savings, £27K car. Kept for 3 years.
Trade in + a little top up, £25K car.
Age of the cars when I bought them was 3-5 years, apart from the new one. The £27K one, 4 years old, cost close to £70K new.
anything slightly older with a few miles on the clock and people believe that it'll automatically rape your wallet. They then go and PCP a new / nearly new car and get raped on depreciation and finance costs.
This exactly, or they try and justify it by saying the newer car will do an extra 10mpg so will be more economical, but spend £££££ thousands just to save a few mpg.
Older cars providing you buy well are normally no less reliable than a new car. Okay they may need a few £100 more in tlc each year but that cost pales into insignificance when compared to costs of lease, finance, depreciation on a new car.
Put it this way, my friends new VW has spent more time in the garage last year sorting various warranty issues than my 13yr old car which went just twice. He also found out in the process just how expensive main dealer service costs are, but being a lease car he's obliged to use them.
Put it this way, my friends new VW has spent more time in the garage last year sorting various warranty issues than my 13yr old car which went just twice.
Ah the extrapolate on incident to help sure up my position....
Sometimes the deals work well for one or the other opinion, everyone is different on top of that whats important to one person is might not be to another. But of course if everyone learned that new cars were a bad buy and went used the used market might dry up...
Mindmap+1.
Totally agree you can get lots of car for not much money nowadays. Plus many new cars you drive just feel generic there's not much between them. The onus is more on gimmicks than the actual car.
I haven't ever though of a car as a percentage of wht I earn. I've always bought a car with what I can afford out of my savings, as and when I need one.
Rover died? Sell it on eBay and drive a banger... Banger died? Buy another one! Repeat.
The pattern got broken when I bought my Passat. I spent 3k on it and it was faultless for four years. Sadly, little things started going wrong this last year and I had to make a tough decision. I traded him in for a grand off the cost of a 57 plate TT which, before anyone says anything, did _NOT_ come with a blow dryer in the back.
Yes it's a ridiculous car with no space for anyone in the back, but every time I sit in it and drive away, I smile. It's lovely. When I can't afford the petrol for it, I'll convert it to LPG.