What shall i do

LNEWTON93

Need some advice please - I am after a new car (as in new I mean an upgrade not necessarily brand new)


I do circa 20K miles commuting to and from work - all motorway driving.


I have two kids (and a mrs)


I get paid mileage allowance of £0.16/mile for my drive to/from.


I need a car that is reliable, and big enough to sit 2 child seats. It also needs to have a bit of oompf in it to make the journey at all bearable.


I am looking at PCP/Lease/HP, low upfront cost, minimal monthly cost.


What is the cheapest and most cost effective thing to do?

BeenThroughItAll

LNEWTON93 wrote: »

What is the cheapest and most cost effective thing to do?

Buy a cheap car outright, and run it until it no longer works. Rinse and repeat.


i.e my 2.2iCTDI Accord Tourer. Bought in February, 123K, <£2K. Now on 135K, 45MPG, fast enough, comfortable enough, decent enough spec, massive boot.


Plenty of good options for less than a couple of grand without sinking money into finance.

LNEWTON93

Thanks for the reply.


Have you had to have any major repair work done?


I understand you can get a car that does +200K miles. But I'm sure with this comes high levels of expense.


For me, I want the cheapest monthly outgoing.

n217970

I bought a 2005 Volvo D5 2 years ago on 150k for £1750 - its now on 210k, and other then normal servicing and consumables it has cost about £350 in repairs. As its a 2.4 it has plenty of power and I always get 50mpg+, and I only have about 4 miles of dual carriageway a day, the rest being single carriageway A or B roads. Its a bloody comfortable car to sit in as well.

Its a risk though, it could have broken down the day after I bought it.

System

LNEWTON93 wrote: »

Have you had to have any major repair work done?

I understand you can get a car that does +200K miles. But I'm sure with this comes high levels of expense.

For me, I want the cheapest monthly outgoing.

My current car:

2010 Ford Mondeo 2.0 TDCi. Bought it at 2 years old one owner with 38k on the clock for £8000, ONE THIRD OF ITS NEW PRICE. 5 years later it now has 125k on the clock. So it has done a fairly consistent 18k a year the majority of it being mostlly major single carriage A road in a rural county and an annual 2,000 mile round trip to France, averages around 55MPG, did have over 65MPG on the run to France despite having four people in the car and a boot full of luggage. Not that much town driving as I live in a small town where you might as well just walk.

Under my ownership I have always had it serviced at the main dealer as Fords are cheap to service with free 12 months pan Europe breakdown and other than normal servicing in line with the manufacturers schedule it has had the following repairs:

70k, trailing link arm bush, £80.
120k rear exhaust hanger broke (original exhaust). Exhaust place said the exhaust was in good condition so they welded a rod on for £20.
120k rubber hose from DPF filter to pressure sensor split (common fault on MK4 Mondeos). £20 labour charge - was less than 2ft of hose so the garage didn't charge for that.
125k N/S track rod end, £70.

Still on original clutch, turbo, injectors etc. The N/S track rod end was the only thing Ford dealership found in its 125k service. Not a total surprise as a deteriorated boot was noted as an advisory when it was MOT'd in January.

This one though however may be more of interest as it goes over 3/4 of the way to 200,000 miles.

Previous car, another Mondeo, 2004 MK3 TDCi 130, ex Company Director's Car one owner full main dealer service history. Bought in 2007 at 3 years old with 90,000 miles on and sold at 8 years old with 165,000 miles on so again around 18,000 miles a year, same type of driving as above, I had it serviced for its entire life with the same main dealer as the above.

100k, cleaned out EGR valve. It wasn't actually faulty but I did it as a precaution after reading about the issue on the TalkFord forums. It wasn't too bad. I did it again at 150k and it was as clean as when I'd put it back on at 100k.
110k Alternator bearing. Cost me OTTOMH around £150 from Ford. Unbelievably it was cheaper to buy a brand new one fitted from local Ford dealer than a recon.
120k Rear subframe bushes (common fault). Got them replaced with polybushes due to being a common issue. £200
120k-ish rear silencer fell off. Think it was around £60.
150k Turbo to Intercooler hose split. Common fault. £80.
155k OSR brake Caliper, I forget how much but I think it would probably have been around £120-£150.

In 5 years and 104,000 miles it only failed its MOT once and that was on the rear caliper. Its now scrapped so you can check yourself. Put EG04DVP into the following:

https://www.check-mot.service.gov.uk/

When I sold it in 2012 it like my current one had no faults shown at the service it had at the local main Ford dealer at 162,500 just before I sold it, still on original turbo, injectors, clutch. Guy who I sold it to wrote it off.

LNEWTON93

I think you have answered my question.

Let's see if I can pick up a Mondeo.

ACG

Ive just handed back a Renault Captur 1.5 diesel.
It was great on the motorway, comfortable and pretty good on the mpg. I was getting about 58mpg from it.

My lease was about £180 a month with a grand down, I could have replaced it with the Medianav model for £140 a month if I had wanted but opted for something different. I did try to buy it but the lease company were being awkward about it.

As its a little higher, it is also pretty handy for getting the kids out of the car seat.

Jonesya

LNEWTON93 wrote: »

I understand you can get a car that does +200K miles. But I'm sure with this comes high levels of expense.


For me, I want the cheapest monthly outgoing.

Do you really want cheapest monthly outgoing, or do you want a fixed monthly outgoing?

I'd say if you want cheapest, then a used car (3-4 years old) from a reliable Japanese manufacturer, probably diesel so getting 50+/gallon is probably the cheapest *average* monthly outgoing if you keep until you scrap it. But you need to budget that there will be occasional maintenance costs.

A good start is buying a car that's reliable to start with - oh, and check if the engine has a chain cam, that'll save you £300+ as no cam belt change costs.

Inner_Zone

Jonesya wrote: »

Do you really want cheapest monthly outgoing, or do you want a fixed monthly outgoing?

I'd say if you want cheapest, then a used car (3-4 years old) from a reliable Japanese manufacturer, probably diesel so getting 50+/gallon is probably the cheapest *average* monthly outgoing if you keep until you scrap it. But you need to budget that there will be occasional maintenance costs.

A good start is buying a car that's reliable to start with - oh, and check if the engine has a chain cam, that'll save you £300+ as no cam belt change costs.

Don't assume a chain wont fail. If it does fail or be know to fail, it would cost a lot more that £300, or even preventative maintenance changing it would probably cost more.

See:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5485950

Jonesya

Inner_Zone wrote: »

Don't assume a chain wont fail. If it does fail or be know to fail, it would cost a lot more that £300, or even preventative maintenance changing it would probably cost more.

See:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5485950

Clearly any component can fail, but belts normally have a limited life (X years, or Y miles) and you would expect to change it at least once, possibly twice or even 3 times during the life of the vehicle, depending on the age and mileage.

A typical cam chain should last the life of the vehicle without replacement. Unless of course there's a design defect with the chain or the engine, but that's a different issue - you could have an engine that eats cam-belts.

Inner_Zone

Jonesya wrote: »

Clearly any component can fail, but belts normally have a limited life (X years, or Y miles) and you would expect to change it at least once, possibly twice or even 3 times during the life of the vehicle, depending on the age and mileage.

A typical cam chain should last the life of the vehicle without replacement. Unless of course there's a design defect with the chain or the engine, but that's a different issue - you could have an engine that eats cam-belts.

You are missing the point, chains do not guarantee good service.

Jonesya wrote: »

A good start is buying a car that's reliable to start with - oh, and check if the engine has a chain cam, that'll save you £300+ as no cam belt change costs.

The purchaser needs to research, BMW, Mazda and Vauxhall all are know for chain issues on certain engines and no doubt there are others also.