Depreciation cost of ownership

LandyAndy

I bought 2 brand new cars 59 months ago.


Mazda6 estate. depn ~£15,000 = £255pm. 104k miles = 14p per mile


Mazda2 . depn ~ £7000 = £118pm. 64k miles = 11p per mile.


No plans to sell either in the immediate future.

19lottie82

Bought a brand new Vauxhall Corsa for £9k (I know, I know!) and sold it 4.5 years later for £4000, so £92.60 a month

forgotmyname

Are you taking into accoutn servicing and repairs or just the buying and selling price?

2004 Mondeo diesel, Bought 2009 for £2300, Sold early this year for £800.
£23.44 depreciation.

If you add in another £1400 for servicing, MOTs and repairs then it would be £45.31 per month.

Much cheaper than any lease option.

IamNotAllowedToUseMyName

1999 Mercedes C240 bought new for about £30K, sold for £250 in 2014, so 15 years old, £2K per year in depreciation, so that is £167/month.

OTOH I bought an S reg Citroen GS 1222 in about 1983 and had it 2 years, £900 second hand, written off 2 years later, got £600 in insurance payout. So £12.50/month depreciation.

So the real secret to minimising depreciation is time travel.

richy999

forgotmyname wrote: »

Are you taking into account servicing and repairs or just the buying and selling price?

Much cheaper than any lease option.

Yes, just buying and selling cost.

In fact, it was prompted by me wondering how the cost compared to leasing.

richy999

IanMSpencer wrote: »

1999 Mercedes C240 bought new for about £30K, sold for £250 in 2014, so 15 years old, £2K per year in depreciation, so that is £167/month.

Ooh, so even buying a brand new executive model has a modest monthly depreciation cost if you keep it long enough.

If only I can ignore that 2 year itch that can only be scratched by scouring auto trader for a new set of wheels :-(

gilbert_and_sullivan

Depreciation is a massive cost but people are more concerned about an extra 10mpg which is piddling in the grand scheme of things.

My worse depreciator was a new pick up we bought @ £21k, which we sold 42 months later for £15k....£142 per month dead loss which sounds horrible to me but was quite good value from the figures above.

Our current cars.
One bought for £9k @ 6 years old 12 years ago, now worth approx £4/5k in current condition.
One 12 year old bought 18 months ago @ £1070 now worth around £1500.
One 15 year old bought 6 months ago @ £3500 and judging by those for sale worth about the same.

Whilst those figures paint a rosy picture of hopefully the right cars (for me that is) bought at fair prices, each and every one has been subject to many hours labour and cost of intensive rustproofing and a general high standard of maintenance all by me, and the 18 year old has needed several bodyshop visits to keep it up to paint standard, plus make specialist maintenance as its an increasingly rare model in unmolested form.

Motoring isn't really cheapo unless you go pure bangernomics, cheapest of all but having a mechanically sympathetic nature doesn't allow all of us to just use and scrap when it fails.

My method isn't any more economically sound than someone paying high depreciation balanced against hopefully zero repairs with obviously better fuel costs, however we're not all the same, those who buy new would hate my old cars, but then i can't abide their modern cars and have no wish for one either.

Fortunately, for the time being at least we are still allowed to drive older cars, that will no doubt change in due course as the govt of the day requires more of our take home pay back .

bowlhead99

gilbert_and_sullivan wrote: »

Depreciation is a massive cost but people are more concerned about an extra 10mpg which is piddling in the grand scheme of things.

Just to run some really basic numbers: 100k miles at 45mpg is 2222 gallons while 100k miles at 35mpg is 2857 gallons and 100k miles at 25mpg is 4000 gallons.

So, if you're considering getting a newer/more efficient car (and fuel economy in modern engines really has come on leaps and bounds in last decade), you can save 635 gallons over your 100k miles by going from 35mpg to 45mpg, which is 2887 litres, call it £3.5k at current prices and it's a figure that's only likely to rise with the price of oil in the next few years.

If you instead upgraded from 25mpg to 35mpg the saving is bigger (because a whole 10mpg extra is a much bigger proportion of 25mpg), you would save 1143 gallons which is 5196 litres or over £6000 in cold hard cash.

So, depending on the cars being considered, getting a 3-year old car with a steeper depreciation curve but good economy and lower servicing costs, compared to an 8 year old car with more to fix and worse mpg... the fuel and servicing savings can go a long way to offsetting the extra depreciation. You may still be out of pocket with the newer car but you are driving around in a newer more comfortable car with more toys, which you might value.

But I agree the logic gets harder to justify when you are looking at a brand new car versus a three year old one for 30-50% off the price, as a few extra mpg is really not going to cover the massive depreciation any time soon.

Obviously there's no point looking at 100k miles-worth of fuel savings if you are not realistically going to keep your old car for more than another couple of years but it can sometimes be worth doing the maths. And of course you have to beware of the fact that manufacturer claimed economy is only for comparing between manufacturer claims and not between one manufacturer claim and your own real-world performance

JP08

Slightly worryingly, have the details for my entire car history on a spreadsheet
Even more worrying is the number of horrors I've owned.
Stand-outs (ignoring the 1st car being a freebie), the Vauxhall Viva at £4.50 a month depreciation, and the Super Snipe (yes it was a daily driver) at £12.50


Fiat 127 --- Hand Me Down: £0.00, Sold: £150.00, Years: 0.75, Monthly Depr: -£16.67
Mini Van --- Bought: £500.00 Sold: £0.00 Years: 0.75 , Monthly Depr: £55.56
Chrysler Sunbeam 1.3 --- Bought: £175.00 Sold: £35.00 Years :1.0, Monthly Depr: £11.67
Morris Ital 1.3Estate --- Bought: £195.00, Sold: £0.00, Years: 0.75, Monthly Depr: £21.67
Vauxhall Viva 1256 --- Bought: £275.00, Sold: £140.00, Years: 2.5, Monthly Depr: £4.50
Vauxhall Carlton 1.8 Estate --- Bought: £850.00, Sold: £250.00, Years: 1.5, Monthly Depr: £33.33
Ford Escort 1.1 Popular Plus --- Bought: £145.00, Sold: £0.00, Years: 0.5, Monthly Depr: £24.17
Ford Cortina 1600 Estate --- Bought: £450.00, Sold: £200.00, Years: 0.5, Monthly Depr: £41.67
Humber Super Snipe SIII --- Bought: £1,750.00, Sold: £1,000.00, Years: 5.0, Monthly Depr: £12.50
Volvo 240 Estate --- Bought: £1,000.00, Sold: £0.00, Years: 4.75, Monthly Depr: £17.54
Mitsubishi Galant 2.0 --- Bought: £2,336.00, Sold: £220.00, Years: 6.25, Monthly Depr: £28.21
Skoda Octavia TDI 2.0 --- Bought: £4,795.00, Est Value: £3000.00 ?, Years: 3.0, Monthly Depr: £49.12

EdGasket

Hyundai Lantra £1000 bought Jan 2007 and still using it. Monthly depreciation approx. £7.75 assuming it is worth about £200 with 6 months MoT left.