How do you budget for your car?

Stoke

For the car itself, I buy outright, so I don't have to worry about finance etc. Yes it's a bigger kick in the balls at first, but I think it works out better.

For insurance, I pay yearly, I get a significant discount if I do.

Flying-High_2

I don't... Anything that pops up is paid for as and when....

Ectophile

I don't budget.

Insurance is paid yearly when it's due - that way I know it's all paid up and I don't have to worry about missed payments leading to cancelled insurance.

All other things are paid for as and when the bill comes in. In practice, that's when the credit card bill arrives.

To be honest, I'd rather not know how much it costs to run a car for a year!

Netwizard

Car is all paid for, so no worries there.

Insurance (£250 odd) paid in one go

MOT - £30 paid in one go when its needed.

Servicing £50 a year.

Hardly breaking the bank really. I have savings set aside, so if I need a few tyres or something like that, I don't have to worry!

Glesgaboy

I see that you budget for your car, including insurance, can anyone tell me why we all pay for car insurance in advance and pay interest for it as well, when you take out a car policy and pay for it in instalments, they want one month upfront and then charge you interest every month even though you are actually paying in advance, this is a racket, nobody should be paying interest on a product or service they have not yet received, total scandal

Netwizard

Most things that you pay for in monthly instalments will attract interest. Bank loans / car finance etc.

The best way to do it is rather than pay in monthly instalments for your insurance, is pay for it all at once, but put it on a 0% interest credit card. That way you can pay it off in dribs and drabs put its still at 0%

Herzlos

The car is generally paid for by a loan that I can easily manage or outright if I can, but I tend to hold onto them for a long time so they are paid off long before I upgrade. Insurance and MOT are annually, and any other costs come out of the general fund whenever they are needed. I'd always rather pay in one go rather than instalments when I can as it should save a reasonable amount of money and is less hassle (I can't have my insurance cancelled because a direct debit failed, for instance).

kkgree1

We're another that puts away savings each month for car tax, servicing and repairs (currently £75 pcm) for two newish cars (1 a year old and 1 almost 3).

Both cars were paid for outright and we're thinking of changing the 3 year old one this Autumn. We budget for insurance separately and pay this annually to avoid the interest charges. We also spend around £250 a month on fuel.

I know that we are lucky to be in the position to pay for our cars easily. Before I met my husband, I struggled to pay for car repairs (mainly used a credit card) and had a car loan.