Which Car Next?

Weird_Nev

You want to save £700 in planned maintenance.....

By Spending £8,000......

Is this just man maths at play or what? If you don't like the Leon, and want to change cars, then that's a valid reason. If that car is acceptable to you in all oher ways, then it's ridiculous to try and avoid a relatively minor and forseen bill on a car by changing cars. The cost to change alone will likely be in the region of £700.

A cambelt every 3 years is NOT outrageous on the scale of bills cars can throw at you - and you had the option of doing the research prior to purchase to work out if that was something acceptable to you or not.

I say keep the car until you actually start a family, when you will probably need a bigger one anyway.

NeededToChooseAUsername

Weird_Nev wrote: »

You want to save £700 in planned maintenance.....

By Spending £8,000......

Is this just man maths at play or what? If you don't like the Leon, and want to change cars, then that's a valid reason. If that car is acceptable to you in all oher ways, then it's ridiculous to try and avoid a relatively minor and forseen bill on a car by changing cars. The cost to change alone will likely be in the region of £700.

A cambelt every 3 years is NOT outrageous on the scale of bills cars can throw at you - and you had the option of doing the research prior to purchase to work out if that was something acceptable to you or not.

I say keep the car until you actually start a family, when you will probably need a bigger one anyway.

This and also what is the point of buying an older car (you said 3-5 years) than the one you have already? Surely it's got more potential for things going wrong & higher maintenance costs.

If you were thinking of selling yours to put down as a deposit/part payment on a new car then perhaps I could see where you're coming from.

Ultrasonic

Weird_Nev wrote: »

You want to save £700 in planned maintenance.....

By Spending £8,000......

It's not that daft as the OP expects the £8k to come from the sale of their current car.

youtellme90

NeededToChooseAUsername wrote: »

This and also what is the point of buying an older car (you said 3-5 years) than the one you have already? Surely it's got more potential for things going wrong & higher maintenance costs.

If you were thinking of selling yours to put down as a deposit/part payment on a new car then perhaps I could see where you're coming from.

I initially thought of using it for a deposit for a newer car, but then that defeated the 'save money' idea. Spending £3-4k to buy a new car which will be cheaper to maintain for 2 - 3 years, but depreciate by more than the current car over the next 2 - 3 years (as the depreciation slows with age normally?) did seem silly.

If we assumed that nothing major would go wrong (major things could go wrong with any car at any point I suppose?), just general maintenance being cheaper, that's what I'm looking at. Obviously I don't want something that has a 20% MOT pass rate, but 50 - 60% is fine?

As Ultrasonic pointed out, the ~£8k would come from this car, it's any extra I might spend that's the cost. So in theory if I got a car for £10k, I'm spending £1-2k, saving £700, so spending £1300, I could then save £200 a year on Insurance, up to £120 a year on tax (depending on the car), servicing could be cheaper? Potentially half the price, saving £200 over 2 years. If it was 10% more economical on fuel, currently I fill up £80 a fortnight, so 10% saving (assuming no change in fuel rates) would be £400 over 2 years.

So in theory, assuming no major maintenance problems - spending £1-2k now, saves me (excluding the £1-2k) £1240 over 2 years, so I'd only be spending £800. Obviously these figures are best scenario and probably over estimated, but I don't think it's THAT expensive?

In terms of the car - does it work? Yes. Does it do the job? Yes. Do I love it? No. I loved the idea of it, but being a naive guy who liked a fast car and had recently been able to spend a bit more money than normal didn't think with my head too much. For example, I didn't even look into the planned maintenance, my Honda Civic had lasted me 2.5 years, gone from 15k miles to 50k miles and only needed a couple of services and some tyres.

Perhaps a better question is, what should I get? OR, any idea how much I might pay at an independant garage getting my cambelt/waterpump/service etc.? Rather than £700 ish at the main dealer?

Netwizard

Buy the bits yourself for a fraction of the cost and find a garage to fit the parts. If your planning on selling it, and it needs a cambelt and service, you would get knocked down on the price when trying to sell it anyway, so best off just getting it done. Its routine maintenance.

Even if you bought a car with a chain rather than a belt, the chain tensioners still need maintenance.

Rolandtheroadie

Netwizard wrote: »

Buy the bits yourself for a fraction of the cost and find a garage to fit the parts.

Probably fine with a lot of things, but I wouldnt do this when it came to a timing belt, tensioners etc.

If the car breaks a year or 2 down the line, who are you going to blame? Did the garage fit it right? or was the belt/tensioners manufacturer to blame.

Netwizard

scotsman4th wrote: »

Probably fine with a lot of things, but I wouldnt do this when it came to a timing belt, tensioners etc.

If the car breaks a year or 2 down the line, who are you going to blame? Did the garage fit it right? or was the belt/tensioners manufacturer to blame.

Personally I've had better service from independents and now I get my cars serviced my an "old school" mobile mechanic, who is a mechanic, rather than a "technician" who plugs a laptop into the car.

I do understand totally what your saying, and on a low mileage newish car like the OP has, I tend to agree, going to a main dealer might be a better option as you have more comeback, but I've had more bad experiences with main dealers than independents.

Two local Honda main dealers quoted me for a cambelt change once when I was enquiring about a service on my car. They didn't know what to say when I told them my car was chain driven and didn't need a cambelt :rotfl::rotfl:

Overall I'm a bit perplexed that the OP has such a nice, rather expensive car, but is worried about a £450 regular maintenance bill. If you want a car with all the latest gadgets like the OP wants, It's obvious that bills and maintenance bills will be higher than running a shed.

Ultrasonic

I think it depends on what sort of performance the OP is will to swap too, as well as what sort of driving they do. The current SEAT diesel is a higher performance version, which if the OP no longer wants then paying extra in running costs for this (insurance, fuel, and I guess more liklihood of needing repairs) then it does actually seem sensible to swap. But not just because it needs a cam belt doing. Also, the longer that a modern diesel is kept the higher the liklihood of an expensive repair bill cropping up.

I can certainly see that swapping to a lower powered petrol car (e.g. a Focus, Civic or Octavia) could in the long run be the moneysaving thing to do.

As far as getting the cam-belt done before selling goes, I'd be tempted to get it done by the main dealer, as might not having an independent do it reduce the sale value? Another option would be to ask the main dealer if they'd consider buying it back knowing that the cambelt and service needs doing.

youtellme90

Ultrasonic wrote: »

But not just because it needs a cam belt doing.
I can certainly see that swapping to a lower powered petrol car (e.g. a Focus, Civic or Octavia) could in the long run be the moneysaving thing to do.

If I was planning to keep that car for another 3-5 years then I wouldn't think twice about the cambelt. My only issue was paying £500 on the cambelt work to then sell the car within 18 months (of the work). I'm currently on ~35k miles and the car is 39 months old. Assuming I hit 40k in May, I'd get all the work done then. So is it then better to swap sooner rather than later? That way the cambelt isn't necessarily 'on the cards'? Or - I accept the price and keep it another 12 months. Then p/x it, having had some use out of the price I've paid.

In hindsight I should've seen that my 'boyracer' streak would end and have got a 'sensible' car to start with.

Ultrasonic

I thought the idea was to sell the car to buy something cheaper, rather than to part exchange it?

Your cambelt change will be 'on the cards' for any potential buyer who bothers to look at the service book. Everyone should but if you are selling it privately you'll obviously get some people who might not.

I think you need to look at specific replacements and do the sums to see what difference it will make.