Car Depreciation

nomoneytoday

Hintza wrote: »

And for those looking for cheaper buy at 5/6 (only after all the big items have been replaced) and run for another 5 years plus.

On the other hand a 5 to 10 year old car will have "bills" and a greater statistical chance of breakdown vs a 2 to 5 year old.

mark5

The problem with buying a second hand car from a dealer is that once you drive it home it's lost money just like buying a new car.

As an example my lease hire Golf would cost about 13-14,000 at the moment from a dealer second hand for its age and spec, if i paid this and drove it home I would realistically be looking at it being worth about 12,000 private sale and maybe 10500 in part ex that same day, the car will still then depreciate at a decent rate.

For this reason I would generally stretch myself to buy as new as possible and try not to change it to often to save on the dealers cut every time you trade up. If you want to beat the system you need to buy at a good price ideally from private sellers and auctions.