Strategy for cheap car buying

doughtsh

I receive a car allowance from my job, and the company has recently introduced a policy that you cannot have a car over 6 years old or which has done more than 100,000 miles. I'm firmly in the "buy a reasonable car cheap and drive it till it dies" camp (currently on a 1999 1 litre Micra) and haven't the first idea about coping with depreciation. I don't care about style or performance (obviously!) - can anyone suggest a good strategy for making this work as economically as possible?

Thanks
Sccott

Cool_Username

If your current car doesn't meet the requirements unfortunately you may have to forgo the payment from your company - seems a bit unfair on the surface but I suppose they've set the criteria so that they're not paying people who have rusty old bangers that are in the garage fifty weeks of the year.

To be honest though if your car is adequate for the job you do then it does seem more than a little unfair for you not to receive the same payment as your colleagues who drive newer cars.

pitkin2020

Isn't the whole purpose of the payment to ensure your driving a newer and more reliable car. Isn't the OP basically buying the cheapest thing going running it till its dead and just pocketing the difference the comapny pays?? May be wrong.

ciano125

pitkin2020 wrote: »

Isn't the whole purpose of the payment to ensure your driving a newer and more reliable car. Isn't the OP basically buying the cheapest thing going running it till its dead and just pocketing the difference the comapny pays?? May be wrong.

And as long as it is under six years old and with less than 100k on the clock, what's wrong with that?

JQ.

Buy a 3 year old ex-lease car at auction and sell it privately 12 months later and repeat. Cars such as Ford Mondeo, Focus, Astra, Vectra will be good buys. The cars will have been well maintained so there shouldn't be any major problems. We bought a Ford C-max at auction last year and it's still worth more than we paid for it. I registered online with BCA so you can do all your searching online. Don't buy anything at your first auction just watch and see how it all works and then go back another day and make your purchase.

Cool_Username

How much is the allowance worth each month?

petrolhead69

do they actually check the papers and mileage? whats to stop you getting something that looks under 6 and sticking a non dating private plate on it and just tellingporkies about the mileage. sounds like a pita policy to me, my work give similar crap saying we cant opt out of having company cars because of reliability, yet the year old bottom of the range vauxhalls and renaults we run drop like flies, not a week goes by in my office without at least 2 or 3 cars needing unscheduled repair work and sometimes we have more vehicles on hire to replace broken cars than we have cars still running. I know for a fact if i was running a well maintaned 7 or 8 year old audi or even a small van with an engine up to the weight it was carrying it would break down less than these underpowered overloaded heaps.

JQ.

petrolhead69 wrote: »

do they actually check the papers and mileage? whats to stop you getting something that looks under 6 and sticking a non dating private plate on it and just tellingporkies about the mileage. sounds like a pita policy to me, my work give similar crap saying we cant opt out of having company cars because of reliability, yet the year old bottom of the range vauxhalls and renaults we run drop like flies, not a week goes by in my office without at least 2 or 3 cars needing unscheduled repair work and sometimes we have more vehicles on hire to replace broken cars than we have cars still running. I know for a fact if i was running a well maintaned 7 or 8 year old audi or even a small van with an engine up to the weight it was carrying it would break down less than these underpowered overloaded heaps.

I would imagine that they would want copies of the V5, MOT and Insurance doc's every year. My company certainly do, however, they don't have weird rules so I'm currently running a 12yr old rwd 2 seater as my company car.

doughtsh

Cool_Username wrote: »

How much is the allowance worth each month?

About £300 a month after tax. This does not mean I want to spend £300 a month on a replacement car that I don't need. Someone else described this as a pita policy. They're right.

doughtsh

pitkin2020 wrote: »

Isn't the whole purpose of the payment to ensure your driving a newer and more reliable car. Isn't the OP basically buying the cheapest thing going running it till its dead and just pocketing the difference the company pays?? May be wrong.

If I was missing work because my car kept letting me down, then fair play - my boss would be having a 'word' with me. As it is my cars have always been reliable.

pitkin2020

doughtsh wrote: »

If I was missing work because my car kept letting me down, then fair play - my boss would be having a 'word' with me. As it is my cars have always been reliable.

Yeah fair do, my point really was to say that the company really wantss the allownace to spend wholly on a car and not just some of it. Either way I would rather have a reliable car than a shiny one, but if your visting clients etc the company no doubt would rather you had a shiny car lol.

Like others have said take a look at the auctions.