When's the best time to buy a car?

Herzlos

Normally I trade in cars at 10 years old, which would be summer 2020.
That's about a year post Brexit.

New car sales are currently down quite drastically, thus in 2 years there will be less 2 year old cars than usual and so on.

I doubt I'll afford one outright so looking at a bank loan.

Do you reckon there will be a sweet spot? Should I buy a new one before prices go up, or gamble on cheaper Japanese imports or demand dropping afterwards?

Pennywise

Are you planning to buy new or used. I usually buy new and have got a cracking deal the last couple of times by buying in March. That's because the dealer have been trying to shift as many cars as possible to hit their targets to get the huge bonuses. Last one was a car with a list price of £21k which I got for just £14.5k (and I only paid £8k of that since I part exchanged a car for £6.5k which the garage only sold for £7k). The time before I got a car for £6k with a new list price of £12k (they must have been very close to the next target). The thing is that they get a higher bonus "per car" if they pass various targets, so selling just one more car could mean additional bonuses on dozens which could amount to tens of thousands!

kabayiri

Prices going up is relevant if the new price of the car is over the £40K threshold.

This was continually an issue when we were shopping. You could see a massive jump in VED just by the addition of a few extras.

chris_m

Pennywise wrote: »

Are you planning to buy new or used. I usually buy new and have got a cracking deal the last couple of times by buying in March. That's because the dealer have been trying to shift as many cars as possible to hit their targets to get the huge bonuses.

Wouldn't February be better than March?
It's still close to the financial year end but also February can a bit of a lean month for them because many buyers will be holding off until March to get the new registration year numbers.

Rough_Justice

In honesty is there really any such thing as a best time to buy a new car?

The buyers of new diesels up to early 2017 would probably say not and who's to say buyers of petrol cars won't face similar at sometime in the future, with the possibility of this increasing with every passing year.
Diesel decline is the reason for your fall in sales BTW.
As for prices or demand, if anybody really knew the answer to that with any degree of accuracy they would almost certainly not need to either read or post in these forums.

With cars as with most things in life, plan your budget and stick to it as rigorously as possible in order to avoid potential hardship.
If as you say you're seriously considering purchase every ten years then a plan of saving over those years would be the preferable option; even a 30K car over 10 years is (at £250/month to save from scratch over ten years) cheaper than a 15K car loan at decent rates.
Plus you earn (a little) interest on savings instead of paying it out for a loan.

Then read what Pennywise says above, too.

Sticking with what budget you have set and applying logic as Pennywise suggests should enable you to work towards the car you want within a few cycles if you're not already there, without resorting to expensive loans.

michaels

Nine forty-five

vivatifosi

Rough_Justice wrote: »

Diesel decline is the reason for your fall in sales BTW.

Does the hike in road tax also play a role?

westernpromise

Car prices have been driven up by TPTB and bankster criminals in a massive Ponzi scheme, but I am reliably informed by a site called carpricecrash.com that they are about to implode and fall 80%. So I'd rent a car until that happens.

westernpromise

Pennywise wrote: »

Are you planning to buy new or used. I usually buy new and have got a cracking deal the last couple of times by buying in March. That's because the dealer have been trying to shift as many cars as possible to hit their targets to get the huge bonuses. Last one was a car with a list price of £21k which I got for just £14.5k (and I only paid £8k of that since I part exchanged a car for £6.5k which the garage only sold for £7k). The time before I got a car for £6k with a new list price of £12k (they must have been very close to the next target). The thing is that they get a higher bonus "per car" if they pass various targets, so selling just one more car could mean additional bonuses on dozens which could amount to tens of thousands!

The trouble is, everyone knows this goes on and it feeds straight into second-hand values without touching the sides. Used cars these days seem to be worth flumpence. I bought a 3-year-old Mercedes with 11,000 on the clock for about 40% of the new price (that presumably nobody pays) and after 3 years I'd guess I might get 40% of that for it.

boliston

the "sweet spot" to buy a new car is when the old one no longer works and is uneconomic to repair

Pennywise

chris_m wrote: »

Wouldn't February be better than March?
It's still close to the financial year end but also February can a bit of a lean month for them because many buyers will be holding off until March to get the new registration year numbers.

The biggest retro registration bonuses are usually quarterly. There are usually other bonus incentives but they're usually on particular vehicles, i.e. where the factory has a lot of a particular model, colour, etc to shift. I think the entire industry know that February is a dead month, so no point in even trying to sell cars - they're all busy selling/preparing cars for 1 March.