After all the threads about which car to buy I’d like to know how much people spend keeping their car on the road per annum , I know it depends on a lot of factors but i reckon some rough figures should help others decide.
I have a theory that modern cars are reliable but cost more to keep in good condition
I’ll start
2006 Mazda6 2.0D
15,000 miles/year
Probably £800/year for servicing + wear & tear

What does the £800 cover ?

not really measurable.

i know some folk who live in an ignorance is bliss world and the car maintainance is ignored unless it STOPs moving/turning on or the MOT is due.

on the otherhand i prefer to keep my motors going well even if it is a banger – a good service costs about 50 quid on most cars to do filters and oil.

i average about 500 quid a year keeping my pug partner in tires , servicing (including 2 timing belts/pulley kits)

Weeksy – MOT, service, tyres, anything that needs replacing etc.
Basically whatever is needed to keep it on the road in good shape.
I use a local garage. Mostly motorway driving

Mondeo Estate (just changed it), over 7 years it probably cost me £400 pa for consumables (ie tyres, exhaust sections, pads, discs etc, suspension parts, the odd malfunction), £150pa for service, £50 MOT. In all that time I can only recall one major issue which turned out to be just a broken wire, but cost £179 to strip down the diesel injection pump to find it.

My 14yr old Octavia estate costs me around £800 a year to keep on the road (exc petrol and tax).

Any more?

FD3S RX7, roughly 10,000 miles a year

£15 for 5L oil, changed every 3000 miles
£15 for 5L oil, kept in the boot for topping up
£10 for an oil filter, once a year
£40 for sparkplugs, once a year
£600 for tires, once a year
£80 for brake pads, once a year
£50 MOT
Tax is £130/year
Insurance ain’t too bad @ £500/year

Fuel… I don’t want to even think about it…

Minus the fuel I put in, I reckon it costs just shy of £1500 a year to keep on the road.

Just spent £1216 for 4 tyres for the Wife’s car. Compared to the £1400 original quote I thought that was good.

£1216 for 4 tyres

😯

Probably £800/year for servicing + wear & tear

over 7 years it probably cost me £400 pa

the key word is ‘probably’. The reality is most people don’t really want to know what their car costs to run.

the key word is ‘probably’. The reality is most people don’t really want to know what their car costs to run.

That’s my point. I reckon mine costs me £800 not including insurance & fuel.

Forget running costs, depreciation is usually the killer…..

My V6 4Motion Golf averaged something like £2.5k a year. Was very unreliable and I’d had it modified so a set of new discs and pads (Brembo GT) were £800. Same again for tyres. Bought it twice over during the 10 years I owned it.

I save £125/month in a ‘car maintenance’ account. I started doing this when I was doing over 30k mile/year and it was starting to get expensive.
So that’s £1500/yr.

From that I pay for tax (£120 I think), MOT (~£50 max), servicing, insurance, tyres…..A while back my OH needed some new front tyres for her car, so I bought them using this ‘pot’ & the amount in there is slowly creeping up (ready for when something major goes ping, no doubt!).

18 months ago (or thereabouts) the AC compressor died which cost me £500 fitted and I paid for that outside of the ‘car maintenance’ savings as this was never really intended for major work. This is the only time that I have paid for any work not using the specific savings I set up and I’ve been doing this for probably 4 years now.
Boring, but it’s a good way of keeping it under control and knowing that I will have the money there to keep the car running.