Budgeting for cars?

ibizafan_2

My Hyundai i20 has just sailed through its MOT and is 10 years old (90,000 miles) OH’s Hyundai i30 is a year older than that and still going strong. Although I could afford to replace it anytime, I’m far too mean to part with the money! When the time comes, we both intend to downgrade to the next model down as we are very impressed with Hyundai generally and see no reason to swap to another make. Not sure about brand new though.

coyrls

Well the ULEZ in London is going to make me a forced seller before October 2021 along with a lot of other people. I am trying to work out how long I can hold out before my car becomes difficult to offload, it's less than 6 year's old but it's diesel.

DairyQueen

'Retirement mileage' makes a big difference. My little Peugeot was purchased 6 years ago. It was then 6 months old and had 3,000 on the clock. Current mileage is 18,000 and it's pristine and reliable. Low running costs, zero road tax and I fill-up about every 3 months. With any luck it won't need replacement for another 5/7 years.

In preparation for retirement OH just changed his 10-year-old VW. He bought an 8-month-old Mazda CX-5 at a bargain price and sold the VW privately. He retires in 18 months so we expect his mileage to drop by at least 50% and plan for him to keep this car for a decade.

All vehicle running costs are included as non-discretionary expenses in our retirement budget. Purchase cost of any future replacements are a capital cost. Not a clue when we will replace or with what but we anticipate spending £20-40k on cars over the rest of our lives. At some point we will be a one-car couple.

ex-pat_scot

we are a one car family, much to Mrs XPS's frustration at times.
I cycle everywhere (and using trains) so it's pointless to have a car sat for use only at the weekend or parked all week at the station.

i normally say that my bike is my second car. (I have 10ish of them though).

We do stupid amounts of miles, but they are mainly child activity related. This will drop off drastically when they leave home and stop dance /drama/ theatre/ music stuff.

I buy cars at 18m to 3 yr old, then run them until 200,000+ miles or they die.

silverwhistle

ibizafan wrote: »

My Hyundai i20 has just sailed through its MOT and is 10 years old .

Mine is also 10 years old, and likewise with the MOT. I've been very happy with it after buying at 4 years old for 4K. The one before that was 4 years old and 4K euros, so you see I don't spend a lot on cars. No reason to change it yet, but I do fancy an EV and a Hyundai Ioniq would do the job, but still too expensive S/H.



I'll review again in a year and a half when my SP kicks in and hopefully prices have dropped, although I have considered dabbling via EVEZY or the like.

jamesperrett

I tend to buy something at around £2.5-3k and run it until it dies. I had my last car for 6 years so it cost less than £500 per year in depreciation and probably between £300 and £600 per year in servicing. It really helps to have a friendly mechanic who can look after it and sort out the MOT's.

getmore4less

Once your mileage drops you can consider moving to vehicles that have higher running costs and higher mileage at purchase.

There are good spec vehicles coming off lease at 3y.

Mileage may be up at 60k but if only doing a few k a year they will still have 7y+ in them

JustAnotherSaver

I keep costs low by not buying expensive cars every 5 minutes.

Bought my car for £1600 in 2008 when it was 7 years old. Still have it now.
Aside from tyres, brakes etc that you’ll pay on any car it’s cost me an ECU at £210 which I replaced myself, a couple thermostats and that’s it.
£145 a year. Not too bad.

k6chris

My 'constraint' is that one of my retirement activities requires towing and travelling up and down the country, so my car usage has gone up rather than down (and I need a car that can tow reasonably well). My initial plan involved an 11 year old Volvo, with 110k on the clock, FSH and a tow bar!! Bought it for just under 3K - already spent £900 on new timing belt etc, tyres and a power steering issue. Hopefully these are 'investments'....... I have a very good local garage, who have been brilliant, but I am questioning if the 'cheaper' older car was a good idea?! Leasing is out (tow bar costs each time and likely body work issues from towing over rough ground). Time will tell if the 'Luxobarge' was a great idea or not!!

SingleSue

My parents purchased a 3 year old car with 18k or so on the clock when dad retired in 2005, 14 years later they still have it and it has sailed through the MOT each year so far.

That said, I think their annual mileage in the last 5 years would barely top 1.5k a year as dad can no longer drive and mum isn't a huge lover of driving (maybe once a week to Morrisons) and more especially car parks...my mileage has gone up by more than the amount that theirs has gone down by as they like my car and me driving!