Haggling possible on new car PCP?

MaximumFish

Hi all,

We're currently driving my dad's old 2004 model Rover 45, which we're pretty certain is about to develop all kinds of expensive faults, and with that and a young family to think about (and protect) we've decided to get a new car. We drove the American equivalent of the new model Mondeo last year and loved it so we're keen to get one of those...

We went into the local Ford dealer at the weekend and spoke to their finance guy (the sales guys were all busy) to get an idea on prices. He tallied up the costs for PCP on a Titanium diesel model, which came in at £384/month for a 4 year term or £475 for a 2 year term. This is on a pre-built car with some options already installed, otherwise we'd have to wait until around September if we fully specced one ourselves (apparently).

We've never bought brand new before so really don't have any idea if there's room for haggling? Especially seeing as it's a brand new style, I can't imagine there'd be much, if any wiggle room? Do different dealers offer different prices?

I guess I could get some prices from competing brands and pretend like we're swinging towards them? I honestly don't know!

Any advice is greatly appreciated! Thanks.

Foxy-Stoat_3

MaximumFish wrote: »

We're currently driving my dad's old 2004 model Rover 45, which we're pretty certain is about to develop all kinds of expensive faults, and with that and a young family to think about (and protect) we've decided to get a new car.

.....is how you have talked yourself into buying a brand new car.

Whats the total deal you are looking at, and must you have a brand new car every 2 or 4 years? Whats the deposit and balloon payment etc?

If you have a young family and you want to protect them as you put it, I would get a bank loan that you can afford over 2-3 years and buy a reasonable car for £5-£8K rather than getting locked into a PCP contract.

If a new car is what you want though, theres not a lot of wiggle room on the PCP deals.

gazfocus

I would say that if the car's a pre-built model, you potentially have some extra wiggle room, but not much. But, as Foxy-Stoat says, you would be much better looking at something other than a brand new car.

There are some pretty good nearly new deals to be had at a fraction of the cost of new, or, you can get a pretty decent year old Mondeo for around £6,000 which would be much, much cheaper than what you're looking at and it wouldn't have the balloon payment at the end either.

forgotmyname

I love Mondeo's they are big, comfortable and CHEAP!!!

They are cheap because they depreciate heavily.

£18,500 for 4 years or £11,500 for 2 years. To me thats just mad.

I bought a high mileage 5 year old one for just over £2000 and sold it 5 years later for £800 having spent £1200 on servicing and repairs in that 5 years.

Well under £3000 for 5 years of motoring.

You can get a 2 year old one for under £10,000, So for less than 2 years PCP you can buy one outright and own it after.

jimjames

Foxy-Stoat wrote: »

.....is how you have talked yourself into buying a brand new car.

Totally agree.

An 11 year old car that "may" develop faults will probably still work out cheaper than getting a brand new car.

Or wait till it does break terminally and then get the new car. PX will probably be very little different.

Inksleeves

I was once in your position MaximumFish.


We were young, had a baby and a new house, we'd never bought a new car before and advice from family was thin on the ground.


My advice, some 15 years after my own experience.....think again.



Those PCP numbers are bonkers, you are landing yourself a huge monthly payment that you are totally locked into for years.


Take a look at your numbers again, you are looking at £457 for 4 years. That's £21936 .

£21,936......twentyonethousandninehundrenandthirtysix....

Thats not including your deposit, then there will be a final payment if you want to keep it.....

Motorpoint will sell you a 2014 Mondeo Tit' with 10k on the clock for £14000.
http://www.motorpoint.co.uk/vehicleadvert/ford/mondeo/534867

Finance that through a loan, First Direct off 3.6% to me at the moment......£313 a month over 4 years.
And at the end the car is yours...it might only be worth 2K, but its yours. It will only be 5 years old.

You want a PCP deal, look at the Renault Zoe. Thats a deal. But buying a Mundano on those numbers....bonkers.


If it were me, and I could go back in time. I'd buy a 2 year old low mileage car on a personal loan.

If I found life getting expensive, you can sell the car and settle the loan.

As for your choice of car...Wife had a Grand C-Max company car, three years, 100K miles, never missed a beat or had a problem...just servicing and tyres.

But check out this.

A Passat for 3 years, £847 deposit, £282 per month - 3 years 10k miles a year.

http://www.whatcar.com/car-leasing/car-leasing/deals/volkswagen/passat/diesel-saloon-1.6-tdi-gt-4dr/business/466766/

Herzlos

As said, an 11 year old Rover 45 shouldn't cost anywhere near £384 a month to keep on the road, and is probably worth very little. Keep it as long as you can and put the change into savings, then look at selling it privately and buying a 3+ year old Mondeo using a bank loan for the difference.

It won't be as shiny as the PCP but it'll be yours for a whole lot less.

daveyjp

I thought new Fords were only bought by fleets at huge discounts so in 6 months they could be sold to the public also at a huge discount.

If you want a new model Mondeo start saving your £475 a month from now. If the Rover fails you can use it for repairs. If it doesn't this time next year you will have £5,700 which is a good deposit for an ex demo model.

=rizla=

In answer to the OP question, yes you can haggle, just the same as if you were paying cash, walking away saying you'll think about it is a great haggling tool. Looking on one website (broadspeed) you can get about £4.5k off a new Mondeo. If you are paying virtually list price then if you use the same deposit, the balloon payment stays the same obviously so £4.5/48 months = ~£100/month cheaper.


I'd also look for pcp deals with 0% APR, as you not only are paying interest on the amount you are paying off every month, but also on the balloon payment.


As has been said obviously buying a brand new car is never a great MSE idea. Also remember to factor into your sums the dealer servicing cost.

MaximumFish

Thanks for the replies, all. I appreciate that this is a money saving site and people tend to balk at things like buying brand new cars, so I should've expected the backlash. :P

Yes, I'm still considering it, weighing up my options. My reasoning behind wanting new is that I've bought a fair few used cars over the years both here and abroad and have always managed to wind up with an expensive dud, whether from a dealer or privately. I just wanted something with some nice modern features, that I enjoy driving, has a long warranty and something that I can swap out or simpy give back when I get bored of it. Leasing/PCP may be an expensive monthly outgoing but it's a fixed one that we can budget around. If I buy used (again) and it winds up needing expensive repairs (again) then the cost is an unknown that we can frankly do without.

Inksleeves wrote: »

Take a look at your numbers again, you are looking at £457 for 4 years. That's £21936 .

No, that was the price for the 2 year deal, so £10,968 in total. Still a lot of money I grant you, but half what you quoted, and pretty much the sort of price I'd be looking at for a decent used car anyway.

Inksleeves wrote: »

A Passat for 3 years, £847 deposit, £282 per month - 3 years 10k miles a year.

http://www.whatcar.com/car-leasing/car-leasing/deals/volkswagen/passat/diesel-saloon-1.6-tdi-gt-4dr/business/466766/

Nice find! Thanks.

And thanks to those that actually answered my question. A lot to think about and consider over the next few weeks.

gazfocus

MaximumFish wrote: »

No, that was the price for the 2 year deal, so £10,968 in total. Still a lot of money I grant you, but half what you quoted, and pretty much the sort of price I'd be looking at for a decent used car anyway.

The difference is, though, that the £10,968 wouldn't buy you the car. You will have a massive balloon payment at the end if you want to keep the car.

I completely get what you're saying about the risks of buying dud's...been there, but there's also no guarantee that your shiny new car won't be a dud. A couple of years ago I bought an Ford Fiesta automatic. After a couple of weeks I realised it had a transmission fault and it was in and out of the Ford dealership like a yoyo. In the end Ford were unable to identify the fault so couldn't fix it.

I'm just saying, don't be fooled into thinking a brand new car will give you trouble free motoring because that's not always the case. You're much better buying something used/nearly new from a Dealer that has a warranty but is a much cheaper option.