To sell my 1 year old car?

[ChidiAnnaKendrick]

Long story short, we had a rubbish run of slightly crap cars, mostly due to not being able to afford decent/new ones.

We still are not in a position to finance a car, but we were incredibly lucky (and grateful) that my parents agreed to finance one for us last year. We paid this finance but it was in my Dad’s name. Recently, due to inheritance, he chose to pay the remainder off for us, so we own an 18 plate car outright. I’m so thankful, truly.

However, the car is.... difficult. We are a family of 6 and it’s a 5 seater. Last year our circumstances were very different and we almost never needed to seat more than 5 of us. Our eldest is 13 though and growing. He barely fits in the back. If we all go out we have to take 2 cars.
Additionally, it’s a Dacia Sandero. It’s vile to drive, and annoys me more daily.

I’ve spoken to DM and she was very reluctant to sanction us changing the car. But they’ve decided it’s up to us, but they won’t bail us out if the replacement needs repair - which seems fair.

Now I’m doubting myself though. Our kids are 13, 11, 8 & 5. Two need HBBs, though 8yo has nearly outgrown it so we’ll be down to just one car seat. Day to day it functions OK, even if I hate the drive. It starts reliably and has 2 years warranty left. If we sell, we have around £4000 to buy a 7 seater that would need to last around 5-6 years.

So should we sell it, buy an older car that fits us in (and pay for any repairs, as we do with the 2 cars we have now) and enjoy the space, or keep it until it dies?

So selling a 1 year old car will raise £4000? I know that they are cheap when new but your parents may have well as stood in their garden and burnt £10 notes.

I would be pretty pissed off.

They enabled you to get a reliable car and after 1 year you want to get rid and get a 2nd hand unknown car. What repairs do you have on a 1 year old car? No mot? insurance? tax?

I would be so angry if I was your parents.
Wow, do what you do, but don’t expect your folks to be ok with it.

Presuming you chose the car itself, and to buy a 5-seater when there are 6 of you, I'd stick it out. You may as well burn the money your parents spent, otherwise. The depreciation on that has been incredible.

It'll be less cramped when you get rid of one of the boosters, and you were never going to fit everyone into a 5-seater, so having to take two cars was a predictable problem. Not liking the drive isn't great, but it's not the end of the world, and you'll be making it worse by entertaining getting a new car. You'll just accept it if you take that option off the table and out of your head.

If you do, it seems that your parents have been very clear that they won't be funding any further cars or repairs, so you'd need a good plan of how you'd fix an old 6/7 seater. I grew up in old Galaxies and Land Rovers, they'd always be breaking. A cheap one is unlikely to last well.

I’m not sure if I made it clear - we were never actually given a choice over which car was purchased and the agreement was always that we would pay for all of it. So there were always strings attached. We were only allowed to buy this one, despite us paying for it.

We didn’t ask, or expect, for it to be paid off. I’m truly very grateful. But we don’t fit in this car!

Also, we’d get the amount my parents paid back. We’ve paid the depreciation ourselves in the payments we made over the preceding 18 months.

Why did you agree to buy a car that didn’t meet your needs in the first place?

£4000 isn’t going to go far for a car the size you want so will end up with an older probably less reliable car

We needed a car! We could have bought another, cheap, banger to keep us going, but we were offered help. I didn’t realise, when I accepted, that there were ‘rules’ for the help. Should have known really.

We only had 3 kids with us most of the time then, but it was selected because it was/is the cheapest car you can buy brand new. It cost £7500. We’ll lose around £2k in depreciation, we paid more than that for it ourselves.

What do you really think you'll get for £4000 and needing a 7 seater? You'll end up with a heap of junk with high mileage, which will soon become a money pit. A one year old sandero might not be the best drive, but neither will a ten year old picasso be. At least you've got a warranty with the car you've got and it's new so you shouldn't have major issues.

We can get a 6/7 yo ford/Peugeot with 70k ish on the clock 2 years warranty.

I wouldn’t never buy a Citroen

If you have 6 instead of 5 to regularly transport around, it seems a no brainer to sell it and get a different, more suitable car

I'd go VAG or Kia/Hyundai for reliability to be honest, Ford, Peugeot, Vauxhall and Renault are pretty poor comparably to these brands.

OP I think you need to be clearer;

• finance is in Dads name
• you pay the finance

Realistically how often does your 13 yr old come out on family outings?
I think your parents are being unreasonable as they don’t pay for it, it’s purely in their name.

The Dacia might be a frying pan, but a £4k seven seater could well turn out to be a fire.

Stick it out for two more years and save.

Bookworm

No finance remaining. We paid it monthly until recently when they decided to use inheritance to pay off what was left. We didn’t ask for or expect this, and it was a surprise so no chance to say no!

13yo has ASD so still comes quite a lot. Only every other weekend though as he sees his Dad.

I don’t know what the right thing is tbh. One minute the car drives me mad with its lack of space, the next I’m so grateful I never have to worry about it dying!

Did your parents not consider you’re a family of 6?
I think you need to explain your reasons to them. Is it worth it? How often do all 6 of you go out together? From my experience it’s hardly an every day occurrence.

How come you family of 5 has suddenly become 6, yet you dont have a baby...? Who is this magical 6th person to have joined the family. An elderly parent /aunt or a DC's friend that is always our on trips with you....??

I intended buying a dacia for exactly the same reasons - as a lone parent with an atypical child I can't afford to be stranded.
Why does it not drive well, can you describe?
Also I can afford 4k so if you are by any coincidence in the north west PM me with the mileage, I need a car literally 4 weeks from now!

If yours selling it imo you have to give your parents back the 4k.

I mean, I bought an 18 year old zafira for £1k 5 years ago, it was less than £100k when I scrapped it two months ago. It was getting difficult and expensive to source replacement parts, otherwise I would have kept it. Replaced it with a newer car as DSS is 18 and able to get about alone.

It’s definitely doable, I’m still really confused why you would ultimately accept a car that doesn’t fit your needs but I guess that’s by the by now. If your parents are annoyed then they’re annoyed, it’s up to you whether you can live with that. Your relationship seems strained if there was originally always these sanctions when buying you a car.

You do realise Peugeots are essentially Citroën? So turning your nose up at Citroën is just stupid when Peugeot is the same car.

Get a bigger car if you want, but don't complain if your parents are pissed with you. They are likely to be.

Just looked it up. They're £7k new?!

What a shame they don't make a seven seater.

Peugeot/Citroen one company, cars built in same way very often on the same chassis. Despite working for several years with Renault he would not recommend any French car.
My DP is a motor engineer for reliability, build quality and value for money he would always recommend Korean (Kia) or Japanese ( Honda/Toyota).

So just to get this straight as I can see people are going to get mixed up, your parents gave you around £4k in cash (or paid off the finance of the Dacia whatever) - that was their gift.

They DIDNT buy you a new car although they did let you take the finance out in their name (assume that was easier?). So if you use the £4k gift they gave you against another car which suits your needs, they have still given you the same gift, towards a car?

So then you will have a car that meets your needs and if it breaks down you have to pay repairs (which of course you would do anyway) - have I got this right?

Because if I have got it right, then your parents gave you c. £4k as a gift towards a car, and you will still have a car with the benefit of the £4k contribution. Just not the car they think you should have.

Sell it and give your parents back their money, then get HP on whatever car you fancy. I dont see how you're 'not in a position to finance a car's but at the same time paying your dad for the finance on this one.

Do they have shares in Dacia? BTW just want to declare I've got a newish Dacia which I tolerate simply because its newish. We paid cash for it, the dealer said "Oh, cash, hmm, only "older" people do that nowadays, like my mum" ...!!!