Car pricing - things going mental or is it just me?
Discussion
OddCat said:
worldwidewebs said:
jhonn said:
You're not alone - the only new car I've ever bought was my MX-5 which cost circa £18k in 2018 - the same car now is £27k ish.
I bought a new MX-5 in February 1991 - it was £15,250. £27k over 30 years later seems a bit of a bargain reallyI can't comment on the price in 1991, seems a lot of money for the time, even in the context of what they are now. However, even at current prices I still thing they're excellent value for money - it's not engineered like a budget car, it doesn't feel or drive like one either.
Further to my previous post, I was just thinking again about depreciation.
We paid £14K for the Vitara SZ5 in 2015. It's now worth about £8k, so it's lost about £6k in 8 years.
However, given to replace it, the equivalent is around £25k, in real terms it's like we've essentially 'lost' about £17k, as this is what we'd need to find to replace it.
That's eye watering and perhaps why so many use PCP or lease, as it avoids thinking about these numbers.
We paid £14K for the Vitara SZ5 in 2015. It's now worth about £8k, so it's lost about £6k in 8 years.
However, given to replace it, the equivalent is around £25k, in real terms it's like we've essentially 'lost' about £17k, as this is what we'd need to find to replace it.
That's eye watering and perhaps why so many use PCP or lease, as it avoids thinking about these numbers.
Andy86GT said:
Further to my previous post, I was just thinking again about depreciation.
We paid £14K for the Vitara SZ5 in 2015. It's now worth about £8k, so it's lost about £6k in 8 years.
However, given to replace it, the equivalent is around £25k, in real terms it's like we've essentially 'lost' about £17k, as this is what we'd need to find to replace it.
That's eye watering and perhaps why so many use PCP or lease, as it avoids thinking about these numbers.
"Avoids thinking".We paid £14K for the Vitara SZ5 in 2015. It's now worth about £8k, so it's lost about £6k in 8 years.
However, given to replace it, the equivalent is around £25k, in real terms it's like we've essentially 'lost' about £17k, as this is what we'd need to find to replace it.
That's eye watering and perhaps why so many use PCP or lease, as it avoids thinking about these numbers.
Yep.
AmyRichardson said:
What I'm driving at is that the last couple of decades have been an era in which a variety of unusually virtuous circumstances have allowed people to procure cars that are considerably "more" (performance, technology/features, raw bulk - or some combination thereof) than people in their income bracket could have stretched to in previous decades - even allowing for technological advances, improved manufacturing productivity and the general growth of the economy.
Now there's something of a correction and having to take a step or two back always stings!
This, to a fair degree anyway. Now there's something of a correction and having to take a step or two back always stings!
Partly driven by oversupply in the market, partly by extended ultra-low interest rates and partly by the relaxation of financing regs and the heavy pushing of PCP / Lease / never-never type arrangements which (in a sense) conned buyers into a rental-style model, foregoing residual capital in the car / the old-style "trading up" journey.
Now the bubble has burst there's a lot of buyers with zero capital in their cars staring down the barrel of BIG increases in monthly cost to keep the same thing they've got used to...at a time when energy bills are still very high, mortgage/rent costs have gone up, etc. etc.
...which of course (alongside the Covid-era supply-chain issues) is keeping 2nd-hand car prices higher than expected as well.
vaud said:
They are also much more reliable, many have 20k service intervals and most modern cars will do 150k+ miles if maintained so even adjusted for inflation the £/mile is much lower in terms of TCO.
If you assume the old Astra had a 60,000mile life and was bought at inflation adjusted number, and assume a new basic Golf now costs £26k and lasts 150,000miles then your cost / mile is 59% lower. Ok, crude calculation but a more modern car is more expensive but will last a lot longer and do more things.
Agree with previous comment that 60k is unreasonably low, but the principle stands. Even if you say 80-90k then there's still c.20ppm difference.If you assume the old Astra had a 60,000mile life and was bought at inflation adjusted number, and assume a new basic Golf now costs £26k and lasts 150,000miles then your cost / mile is 59% lower. Ok, crude calculation but a more modern car is more expensive but will last a lot longer and do more things.
...until you get to repair costs. Out of warranty, that Astra would have been piss-easy to service and cost pittance to repair. The modern equivalent Golf is much harder for your average Joe-in-the-street to look after himself, has a LOAD more stuff to go wrong (and all the emissions-compliance software/engine management puts more pressure on that part of the car) even if individual components are more reliable, and part prices are a LOT higher.
...so I'd say the post-warranty ppm figure is a lot worse for the Golf.
jhonn said:
OddCat said:
worldwidewebs said:
jhonn said:
You're not alone - the only new car I've ever bought was my MX-5 which cost circa £18k in 2018 - the same car now is £27k ish.
I bought a new MX-5 in February 1991 - it was £15,250. £27k over 30 years later seems a bit of a bargain reallyI can't comment on the price in 1991, seems a lot of money for the time, even in the context of what they are now. However, even at current prices I still thing they're excellent value for money - it's not engineered like a budget car, it doesn't feel or drive like one either.
They were offering base spec 1.5 SE cars for £14k at the time, new not pre-reg, and with the same comedy low interest rates.
Outrageous bargain at the time, they whacked up the RRP in October 2019 and it just keeps going up. Interestingly the used price for even 1 year old ones at trade in no way reflects the new higher RRP.
v9 said:
GeniusOfLove said:
I remember my father buying an 86 D reg Cavalier in 1987. He had it for what felt like forever but it actually went off to the scrapman in 1994 having had the rust painted over at least once, which was a decent innings for an 80s car. Not sure what mileage it was at but I'd be surprised if it was much over 100k. Totally par for the course, and for the latter half of it's life I'm sure it drove like a bag of s
t too.
Look at it per year of life of per mile of life and I'm sure modern cars are a vastly cheaper ownership proposition than the old crap people get misty eyed over.
I bought an ‘87 Cavalier 1.6GL as an impoverished student in 1994 for, I think, £400. It had just under 100k miles on it. I thrashed the bejesus out of it for 4 years doing lots of miles all over the country on a mix of work and climbing trips, loads of motorway miles at pretty much as fast as it’d go (no speed cameras to speak of in them days). It finally threw a rod at 185k miles, but was certainly fine to drive and was subject to huge abuse by an idiot younger me. To suggest ‘80s cars only did 60k is nonsense. I was there! t too.Look at it per year of life of per mile of life and I'm sure modern cars are a vastly cheaper ownership proposition than the old crap people get misty eyed over.
I took a few 80s Fords and Vauxhalls to well into six figure mileages over the years. They ran and drove fine, but in all cases it was rust (more time related than mileage) that got them in the end.
My 1985 mk2 Cavalier SRi was failing MOTs on corrosion in 1994, and was scrap by 1996. Engine still ran like a Swiss watch and went really well, even at 155k.
Limpet said:
Yep, came here to say similar.
I took a few 80s Fords and Vauxhalls to well into six figure mileages over the years. They ran and drove fine, but in all cases it was rust (more time related than mileage) that got them in the end.
My 1985 mk2 Cavalier SRi was failing MOTs on corrosion in 1994, and was scrap by 1996. Engine still ran like a Swiss watch and went really well, even at 155k.
Agree with that, once corrosion was sorted in the 90s cars with pretty much the same engines as the 80s models were lasting 25+ years and only getting scrapped for asinine reasons like needing four tyres.I took a few 80s Fords and Vauxhalls to well into six figure mileages over the years. They ran and drove fine, but in all cases it was rust (more time related than mileage) that got them in the end.
My 1985 mk2 Cavalier SRi was failing MOTs on corrosion in 1994, and was scrap by 1996. Engine still ran like a Swiss watch and went really well, even at 155k.
Sorry if I didn't make it clear, it was corrosion that I remember doing in all the 80s stuff, rather than mechanical failure.
vaud said:
They are also much more reliable, many have 20k service intervals and most modern cars will do 150k+ miles if maintained so even adjusted for inflation the £/mile is much lower in terms of TCO.
If you assume the old Astra had a 60,000mile life and was bought at inflation adjusted number, and assume a new basic Golf now costs £26k and lasts 150,000miles then your cost / mile is 59% lower. Ok, crude calculation but a more modern car is more expensive but will last a lot longer and do more things.
I disagree.If you assume the old Astra had a 60,000mile life and was bought at inflation adjusted number, and assume a new basic Golf now costs £26k and lasts 150,000miles then your cost / mile is 59% lower. Ok, crude calculation but a more modern car is more expensive but will last a lot longer and do more things.
I was contracting in 1987 and bought a new Cavalier 2.0 to get me to whichever office I was working at.
It was stolen in 1993 with 160k miles on it (or thereabouts) and was still going strong. Only problem I had the cambelt snapped at 4 or 5 months old with 26k miles on it, but that was fixed under warranty.
The Astra, Cavalier, Escort and Sierra were the mainstay of the rep market and most did massive miles back in the day.
You just need to look up the problems Ford are having with their Ecoboost engines to compare reliability now with the 1980's.
Lad who worked for me a few years ago had a new company 1.5 Tsi Golf, based on some of the issues he had no way was that going to make it to 100k miles.
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