To ask what year your car is?

[Hairy09]

Mine is a 2012 hatchback, I wanted something cheap, reliable, easy to run and cheap repair costs and I'm happy with what I've got. I seem to be in a friend circle with nothing older than 2020 which is tough where they all fawn over each other's car but I've made the correct choice for me. Which is yours?

2012, I'm happy with it but never really been a petrol head

2020 BMW

21

Because when the warranty runs out you can end up with rather expensive car bills.

My Range Rover failed its first MOT and needed thousands spending on it. Thankfully was still just under warranty.

They aren’t all like that I’m sure but not worth risking. If we have one that’s well behaved we will buy an extra years warranty and keep for 4 years.

As to what we buy them - because nothing else comes close in terms of snow ability, towing, height for off road, power for pulling stock boxes, plus when washed they look nice for going somewhere fancy for the weekend! My husband is 6’4” and finds it hard to fit in a lot of vehicles. The defender has great head height and we can put three grown up kids in the back without them feeling squashed.

I'm sure replacing so often costs more in the long run due to depreciation etc. The average car on the road today last 13 years, and in reality, it will be higher than that because the average will be skewed by cars written off at a younger age due to accidents etc.

Major/expensive repairs really aren't the "norm" - cars that haven't been hammered, have been properly serviced and well driven have the potential to easily last over 10 year without big expensive repairs. Unless it's a make/model well known for poor quality or unreliability - but you can google to avoid those.

2013 but I’m looking at replacing it

2011- I’ve had it many years and it has been a fab car. It’s well maintained and I will keep it as long as I can.

Have you ever owned a landrover?!

DH and I drive older, fully paid off cars because we don't want the monthly payments but the overall costs don't stack up as clear cut as you might think. To be fair, I'm talking about cheaper cars, but due to my dh's meticulous paperwork I was able to check the costs of him buying a Peugeot 206 from 1 year old, and keeping it until it died 13 years later, so every service, MOT etc etc etc. I compared this to the Polo we got on PCP when it died, and figured out that the overall cost of the replacing the Polo every 3 years on PCP and making the monthly payment, was almost identical to buying a car of similar size/value and running it until it died.

I also remember my mum having to pay 5 grand to service a Landover discovery in the early 00's, can't imagine what it would be now, so can easily believe it's cheaper, or a similar cost and way less hassle, to just keep replacing them.

If you service and repair older cars yourself the overall costs reduce considerably.

2023

Likewise, I keep meticulous records. Our 2008 car has only cost us less than £100 per month over it's life, including purchase price, servicing/repairs, etc. Not including road tax and insurance which presumably are still payable if you take out a PCP (though maybe/maybe not on a lease??). You can't lease a car for less than £100 per month, so it's definitely saved us a lot of money over the 18 years! Still hope to sell it for around £2k in the next year or two, so that's pure profit on top!

A previous car cost even less, we bought it new (again), and kept it until 200k miles. That worked out at around £75 per month, didn't need anything major doing to do either during all that time. Just serviced to schedule and had whatever things replaced as per service schdule/garage recommendations.

Interesting. Ours had ended up costing us £170 a month and we got precisely £90 for it at trade in (would have been £100 but we'd lost one set of keys 😂) and the Polo was £177 a month. As I say we prefer to own our things, so that car was our one foray into a PCP model. But I was surprised just how little the difference worked out to be.

We do. An older one. No tax or MoT needed and insurance is £120 fully comp. Maintenance is pennies.

It also has appreciated in value considerably since we (DH) bought it.

2023 (it’s the family car )
2016 (smaller runaround)

Main car is 2021. Bought it a few months ago with more than 100,000 miles on it and intending to run it forever.

Run around car is 2016. Bought 18m ago, again with more than 100,000 miles on. We'll run that til it dies too.

Both EV which was important to us.

2024

Will replace next year.

But it’s a mobility car and adapted for DS so we have to renew the lease (and pay the adoption costs) every 3 years.

Before that I’d buy a 5yo car and keep it for 10 years or so until it cost more to keep on the road than it’s worth!

1984, 2006, 2010, 2013 & 2019

The three newer ones are the highest maintenance - too many sensors and electrics to go wrong!

Mine are 2017 and 1987.
DH's is 2012.