Is car finance the way to go now?

Careful here - "Balloon" is a lease purchase thing - it's a term that's crept in as people merge types of finance together without understanding subtle differences.

With lease purchase you have to repay the balloon - it's not optional like it is with a PCP. Of course you can p/x the car and start a new agreement but if it's worth less you have to make up the difference.

Strictly, that's wrong too. The GFV might be £15K but the car could be valued at £12K. This is an issue if you really wanted to keep the car - you'd have to pay £15K for a car only worth £12K.

For this reason GFV is tending to be dropped as a term now and you'll increasingly see it called Optional Final Payment.

PCP is a lease.

Really? I'd be amazed. Do you have any example of that?

No it's not. The clue is in the name.

I'm just somebody who's been using LP/PCP for the past 16years, working in the FS sector for 8 of those years. At any point in a PCP you can walk away and 'settle', pocketing any £difference, in a PCH/PCL you can't. You have no stake equity in a lease, becsuse you are hiring, not purchasing.

OK... So what's the distinction between lease/non-lease?

I'd assumed it was something to do with intent to own, and if the entire value of the 'asset' appears on the balance sheet?

So are PCP'ers "renters" after all?

I don't know about underrated - it sounds a bit entitled, if you ask me. Life has always, irrespective of generation, been a case of living within means. It's a simple fact of life that if you can't afford something then you can't have it. If you can't afford to live in the area you truly desire, then you're either not earning enough or not saving hard enough. Worrying about the car you own (and spending anything but the essentials on a hobby) at the same time as complaining that you can't afford to get on the property ladder is a bit tough to understand.

Did you ask your parents what they were doing before they bought their house? I bet they weren't renting privately, enjoying expensive hobbies, taking foreign holidays and having an active social life.

You might complain that previous generations had it easier to buy property, and that's absolutely true. But we have numerous advantages that they could only dream of, such as social mobility, world travel and access to technology. It's a case of swings and roundabouts.

Funny that the only reason I bought a BTL on top of my own home (eventually btw - I had to work bloody hard to get to that point) was to treat myself on the car stakes. My thinking was simply, buy a BTL which generates circa £200-£300 pcm which I happily spend towards finance on a fun weekend car. It doesn't pay for the weekend toy but it certainly pays the plus part of the costs. Hopefully the BTL asset will be worth more at retirement age, after the government have finished fleecing me!

Why? - if something needs sorting out (and I agree it does) why do you, or why does anyone have the right to sit there and say that someone else should sort it out? if you believe it needs to be sorted out - get involved and sort it out - what this country needs more than anything else is decent politicians - we have some, we need a higher % what we do not need is people sitting there saying that someone else should do it...

Do you actually know anything about economics? You can pay sub $100 per acre in parts of e.g. Texas - but an acre of farm land to build on in the UK might cost you £1m - 10,000x the price (or more if e.g. in the centre of London...) on that basis, we do well as our houses are bigger than 1:10,000 of a house in Texas... (NB building costs etc. will be more similar though still differ around the world... but land is the biggest issue in the UK).

With the attitudes shown, perhaps so - but you won't find it better anywhere else...
It is a sad reflection on some parts of our society that they feel:
- they are owed a living
- owed a property
- it is someone else's responsibility to sort it out (usually the politicians / someone who has made money through hard work / their parents...)
- it is better everywhere else in the world

wake up to the real world - for generations there have been a few lucky enough to be born into wealth, everyone else has had to work to earn a living / earn a house / earn food etc. - the current 'young' generation is far better off than any before it. The average teenager owns 6 digital devices and leaves home wearing clothes and carrying devices on average worth up to £1,000 - a far cry from previous generations - today's teenager is more likely to expect new clothes / bikes / toys / phone / etc. - a generation ago, clothes were more likely to be handed down / passed to other families, bikes circulated amongst families and a few toys were all that would be in the house... Even when hitting adulthood there are now more opportunities than ever before for a variety of jobs and the ability to work worldwide, the opportunity to make money has never been so good... There has been a generation growing up where they expect their parents to both work in order to enjoy more consumables - and it seems that the same generation has now moved into their 20s and 30s somehow expecting to be bought houses as well...

get a reality check and start looking to change things, as I said above, I agree that the housing market is out of balance - but take responsibility for it, it is where it is, grouching about it will not suddenly put it back - so if there is a solution, be a part of that solution instead of expecting others to do it for you - if you are young then you have more to gain from changing the country to a better place, why should others do it for you?