Optimum age/mileage to get rid of a car?

DominicH

I'm thinking that buying a new-ish used car and running it until about 8 years of age or 80,000 miles is a good strategy, in terms of value for money. My reasoning is that not much goes wrong before that point, but you still get to drive a nice up-to-date car with all mod cons, safety features, low maintenance costs etc. Depreciation, averaged out over the maybe six or seven years of ownership, is not too bad - e.g. buy at £12,000, keep for 6.5 years, sell at £3,500, that's £1,300 per year.

Consider all the things that tend to need fixing/replacing on older cars. Timing belt, suspension components, transmission components, etc. etc. Expected lives of these things seem to cluster around the 100,000 mile point, plus or minus 50,000 miles. Since there are so many such components, you can expect some of them to fail before their expected life, and they generally cost several hundred quid to fix, if you're lucky.

Basically, an 80,000+ mile or 8-year-old car is a ticking time bomb of repair/maintenance bills. A 60,000 mile/ 6-year car, not so much. That is why I think one should dispose of a car in that timeframe.

Chimpofdoom

Not quite sure your reasoning here..

Your depreciation will depend on what brand of car it is, popularity and of course condition.

If you look around online, a 7 year old Honda civic is worth more than a 7 year old Vauxhall Astra.

Plus I recently departed with a 12 year old Astra that was pretty reliable and out of the 7 years I owned it, didn't cause me much trouble. Had 38k on the clock when I bought it, had 125k when I recently traded it in.

You would be better spending half that cash on an older car and having the cash saved up in case things go wrong.

Joe_Horner

Seeing as our newest car was made in 1974, has 105k miles on the clock, cost £200 18 months ago and is now worth at least double that (simply by being back on the road), and has had total maintenance bills this year of £143 including its MOT, can't possibly comment on this one

eta:

Obviously we do without a lot of mod cons but we have heat, cold air, sounds, and as much safety as you can get by not driving into things (helped by visibility that's FAR better than any modern!).

We also get a hell of a lot more admiring looks and comments than we would by just having "a reasonably new and presentable car"

SailorSam

Modern cars are a lot more reliable than they once was. You always hear it said the most important thing is always get one with a good body 'cos the rest can be replaced.
If you estimate the car is costing you £1300 a year in depreciation alone you're going to be pretty unlucky to pay that much in a year for repairs. If you look after it i think a new car should last well over 8yrs without it becoming a shed.

DominicH

Depreciation is 15 - 20% per annum for regular, non-classic cars, depending on desirability. I'm talking averages; I know that people will come up with anecdotes of their old cars that don't need anything except brake pads. Forums are like that, but anecdotes are not data. Outliers like cars from the seventies don't have much bearing on real-life averages.

DominicH

SailorSam wrote: »

Modern cars are a lot more reliable than they once was. You always hear it said the most important thing is always get one with a good body 'cos the rest can be replaced.
If you estimate the car is costing you £1300 a year in depreciation alone you're going to be pretty unlucky to pay that much in a year for repairs. If you look after it i think a new car should last well over 8yrs without it becoming a shed.

You could easily pay £500 to £1000 a year more in maintenance for an older car (DMF, anyone?), and also there is value in having a newer car. Newer models tend to be better - more features, better refinement, better handling, etc. A mark 7 Golf is a significantly better than a new Golf of 10 years ago.

OddballJamie

One thing that can be certain of is that fuel will be more expensive when you come to sell it.
So to suffer the least amount of depreciation buy something very economical by todays standards. Then in 6 years hopefully it will be classed about average so should fetch more than an equivalent gas guzzler.

Joe_Horner

DominicH wrote: »

Outliers like cars from the seventies don't have much bearing on real-life averages.

No they don't.

But "optimums" aren't about averages, they're about optimums. And in terms of cost some of the "less loved" 70s mand early 80s models hit the optimum in just about every way:

Optimum insurance costs: £69 per year fully comp on ours

Optimum depreciation: Far more likely to gain value than lose it

Optimum maintenance: Simple, generally cheap parts, and few (if any) bits that need to be replaced on mileage / time / "just in case"

Optimum reliability: Believe it or not, a well maintained car of this age will be just as relaible as anything modern, and far more likely to be repairable quickly if there is a problem. Less to go wrong generally means less going wrong.

Obviously, they're not for everyone, but they are optimum in a lot of ways and that's what you asked about

OddballJamie

Another option is to buy a six month old Kia, then sell it at seven years old when the warranty expires. That's if you're worried about that kind of thing.

Personally I plan on keeping my 'lifetime warranty' car bought in Sept 2010 until it hits 100,000 miles (currently 18k).

Chimpofdoom

DominicH wrote: »

You could easily pay £500 to £1000 a year more in maintenance for an older car (DMF, anyone?), and also there is value in having a newer car. Newer models tend to be better - more features, better refinement, better handling, etc. A mark 7 Golf is a significantly better than a new Golf of 10 years ago.

You can easily spend that on a newer car too!

Statistically you shouldn't have problems.. but that doesn't mean they won't happen or be costly. How much do they charge to plug a computer into your car these days? £180? That's before they even fix it the thing...

cardinalbiggles

Joe_Horner wrote: »

and as much safety as you can get by not driving into things (helped by visibility that's FAR better than any modern!).

Thats one of the most ludicrous statements I have ever seen on here, honestly, please tell me you don't believe that!