At what point do you replace a car?

bobby9205

Ive done a bit of buying and selling of cars, mostly via Ebay.

I have bought loads of cars around the £500 mark ( Im currently driving a Chrysler Neon on a X plate - 67,00 miles fsh with full leather, air con etc in great condition and it cost me £550 and that was with 10 months tax!!! and my wife drives around in a V plate Hyundai Accent with 50,000 miles on it which cost us £250, we have had it 2 yrs and its never let us down but if it did we would get rid and get another)

I also had loads of Daewoos, Hyundias, Kias etc which have been brilliant cars.

Have a look at a Daewoo Nubira - they go for nothing, I bought one on a 02 plate with 50k miles in good nick for £500.

My point is that I get good cheap reliable cars, drive them for a bit, then sell them on, usually at a profit, if theres anything going wrong with it I get rid at the car auction and cut my losses.

If you google "bangernomics" (or something like that!) you get a whole raft of info on people doing similar stuff - buying cheap cars, running them into the ground then getting another. I dont quite do this but you get the drift.

Me personally - I wouldnt spend that sort of cash on a old Mondeo, these cars go for nothing, I would scrap it, but I understand its a personal choice.

AdrianHi

If you like the Mondeo and you really are able to contain the outside routine servicing maintenance and repairs inside a £500 a year budget (approx. £42 a month) it's a keeper.
To put it into perspective, on a long term average monthly basis the difference between your car and something similar nearly new underwarranty (so only servicign costs, no repairs) is somewhere in the region of £100-£150 extra, but you do have to finince the purchase.
That's an approximate all in figure, depreciation, finance charges, fuel etc.
In my opinion, if your repairs start heading towards the £90-£100 a month / £1000 year on average point it's time to ditch the car and move on, preferrable to something with predictable costs unser warranty.

If you were prepared to downsize to a smaller chepaer to run car, you could be near the breakeven point for changing to something young already.

loracan1

Cost 570 in the end - needed front brakes sorting too. Did say it's a very good drive for a car its age, though that may just have been sugarcoating the pill.
I looked into this Bangernomics stuff but I've little car knowledge so don't trust my own judgement and don't really know anyone I'd be prepared to drag round to look for me. And as the guy said - where could I buy a car for that price and know its history.

From now on I'll keep it to minor servicing and keeping my fingers crossed!

bobby9205

loracan1 wrote: »

Cost 570 in the end - needed front brakes sorting too. Did say it's a very good drive for a car its age, though that may just have been sugarcoating the pill.
I looked into this Bangernomics stuff but I've little car knowledge so don't trust my own judgement and don't really know anyone I'd be prepared to drag round to look for me. And as the guy said - where could I buy a car for that price and know its history.

From now on I'll keep it to minor servicing and keeping my fingers crossed!

Glad to hear it worked out for you ok, like I said in my post - its a personal choice. I know a fair bit about cars so can be confident in my choices, you know your Mondeo.:beer:

scubaangel

My previous car was a Micra, I bought it at 12 years old for £400, but it needs silly amounts of work doing so I scrapped it rather than MOT'ing it again. The car I replaced it with was a P-reg clio, its first MOT cost me £350 which is what I paid for it, and its due another MOT this summer which I expect wouldnt cost as much, so I planned on keeping it at least another 12 months.

The Micra had done around 100k when I bought it, the Clio 120k, the Clio has now done 135k and as far as I can tell has nothing mechanically wrong (could do with a screw putting on the bumper as its coming loose and a few cosmetic bits need doing). I consider both 'throwaway' cars to be run until I simply couldnt afford/be bothered to sort them out before buying another.

I guess after having a car from new its better to spend the money on replacing the bits which need doing for the sake of familiarity and you know the history of the car.

AdrianHi

There will probably come a point where you will spend £500 on it which is in budget, then a couple of months later it will want another £500. You just have to walk away from it at that point and stop throwing good money after bad.

Look at this depreciation chart from where the Mondeo 2.0 Edge petrol is 1 year old to 2 years old.
http://www.whatcar.com/depreciation-index.aspx?RT=2732&ED=51609&U=0
Depreciation is £1161 for a year, no MOT, no welding, no repairs (warranty), cheaper to fuel, slightly lower tax disk, breakdown cover included.
£8500 loan paid over 36 months 8% APR carries a £30 a month interest charge and a repayment of about £265 a month.
These are the sorts of numbers to have in your head as the repair bills on the old car come in and you can see here why the older car is not that much cheaper than the newer one. The newer one just gives a cash flow challenge in loan repayments and you need to know you can depend on your income being there to make the payments.
Incidently the new model Focus depreciation curve is very different to the Mondeo and it looses money a lot faster in year 2 so actually turns out to be more expensive in real terms, evens out year 3.

Pee

I'd change it at the price I could get a new one that I was happy with. So I once let a Granada go although it needed very little doing, but it's gear box went for the next person quite soon after. (They didn't mind too much as I had given it them.)

My last car I changed because it was looking a bit old - K reg - so I now have a nice new V Reg, which seems so swish and up to date to me. I just love the stereo!!!