The low mileage club
Discussion
Possibly not a popular topic for PH, but are are many people finding they're not using thier cars much any more?
We dropped from 2 cars to 1 when we moved a couple of years back, but living on the outskirts of a city don't use it that much, mostly for holidays and the occasional weekend trip, and it can go weeks at a time without being used.
Just had it serviced and it's done about 12000 miles in 26 months, so about 5500 miles/year
We dropped from 2 cars to 1 when we moved a couple of years back, but living on the outskirts of a city don't use it that much, mostly for holidays and the occasional weekend trip, and it can go weeks at a time without being used.
Just had it serviced and it's done about 12000 miles in 26 months, so about 5500 miles/year
My mileage seems to be about 6kpa now, half what it was in 2019, few reasons:
-WFH 2-3 days a week
-Moved slightly closer to places we go frequently
-Upgraded my Wife's car so use hers a bit more (although overall, her mileage is probably 5kpa so still low, up from 4kpa)
Would be a nice saving, had fuel prices not gone mad. In my Mercedes 500pm is 1 tank which is nice, although I'm about to take the plunge on something a bit more thirsty.
-WFH 2-3 days a week
-Moved slightly closer to places we go frequently
-Upgraded my Wife's car so use hers a bit more (although overall, her mileage is probably 5kpa so still low, up from 4kpa)
Would be a nice saving, had fuel prices not gone mad. In my Mercedes 500pm is 1 tank which is nice, although I'm about to take the plunge on something a bit more thirsty.
joropug said:
Would be a nice saving, had fuel prices not gone mad. In my Mercedes 500pm is 1 tank which is nice, although I'm about to take the plunge on something a bit more thirsty.
I'm looking at replacing my car at the moment and it does seem a bit silly to be considering spending so much on something I use so little, but at least I'm not concerned about mpg like I was back when I was doing 30k miles/year 
I bought the family Passat in Jan 2020 with the intention of transporting Vikingette1 to/from University. Feb 2020 were the early inklings of Covid and March 2020 was the start of UK Covid, WFH and queuing for supermarkets. By Jan 2021, and the first service, I'd covered 1,300 miles. If it as a petrol car, the oil would still have been golden syrup.
Ashamed to say our Abarth 500 has only done 198 miles since last September. Both working from home aside from one day and always take the five door for this occasional commute and for shopping etc. Did think about selling it, but insurance was only £130 this year and it’s been with us since 2014.
I bought a BMW 325i in 2018 and did 7,000 miles in a year (plus a few thousand in my Z4) mostly visiting/caring for my Mother who lived 35 miles away.
Then I replaced it with a 330i and a few months later she had to move into a home so I didn't need to visit as often. Then in March 2020 for obvious reasons I couldn't visit, apart from a couple of times for a distanced outdoor visit in the summer and then even those got stopped.
She passed away in November 2020 and as I'm no longer working I've only put 11,500 miles on it in 3 and a half years.
Then I replaced it with a 330i and a few months later she had to move into a home so I didn't need to visit as often. Then in March 2020 for obvious reasons I couldn't visit, apart from a couple of times for a distanced outdoor visit in the summer and then even those got stopped.
She passed away in November 2020 and as I'm no longer working I've only put 11,500 miles on it in 3 and a half years.
RizzoTheRat said:
Possibly not a popular topic for PH, but are are many people finding they're not using thier cars much any more?
We dropped from 2 cars to 1 when we moved a couple of years back, but living on the outskirts of a city don't use it that much, mostly for holidays and the occasional weekend trip, and it can go weeks at a time without being used.
Just had it serviced and it's done about 12000 miles in 26 months, so about 5500 miles/year
I commute by walking+ train and still do over 20K a year, so no.We dropped from 2 cars to 1 when we moved a couple of years back, but living on the outskirts of a city don't use it that much, mostly for holidays and the occasional weekend trip, and it can go weeks at a time without being used.
Just had it serviced and it's done about 12000 miles in 26 months, so about 5500 miles/year
A few years ago I took my Impreza for an MOT. It had registered 6 (six) miles between MOTs, in near enough a year. That would have been the three miles to the garage, and then back again. Nowadays it tends to average a heady 1500 miles per year.
My Mini gets driven very rarely. The MOT has expired now (I'll probably get that sorted before I SORN it for the winter) but the last MOT, in June 2021, showed 64,291 miles on my Mini. It's now around 64,350 miles - less than 100 miles in 15 months. I'll probably trailer it for its MOT and service, so it's likely that it'll be <150 miles in 24 months.
My Mini gets driven very rarely. The MOT has expired now (I'll probably get that sorted before I SORN it for the winter) but the last MOT, in June 2021, showed 64,291 miles on my Mini. It's now around 64,350 miles - less than 100 miles in 15 months. I'll probably trailer it for its MOT and service, so it's likely that it'll be <150 miles in 24 months.
A no brainer for me when switching from my first car a VW Polo, to my second car, a BMW 330e, was that for the miles I do (probably around 7K p.a, if not less) 95% of those miles were around 25 miles or less. That allows me to use the EV mode as much as possible (currently getting around 22 miles on pure EV) and my petrol bill has reduced a lot.
I would have went pure EV if i could, but the choices in my budget were pretty restrictive (Nissan Leaf, old Renault Zoe the main contenders) and PHEV suited me better as I do go for the occasional long trip or blast.
Having had a brand new Renault Zoe Rapid charge for a month, it was probably a really appealing package for someone who does my kind of mileage and had a home charging solution. 215 mile range. It’s just out of a lot of people’s reach price wise.
That being said my mum does around 15,000 miles a year so makes me feel like I don’t drive at all.
My dad (who lives elsewhere), on the other hand, works from home, has 3 cars.
His “daily” clocked up just 900 miles, his weekend car clocked up 2.5k, and the shed clocked up just 82 miles
I would have went pure EV if i could, but the choices in my budget were pretty restrictive (Nissan Leaf, old Renault Zoe the main contenders) and PHEV suited me better as I do go for the occasional long trip or blast.
Having had a brand new Renault Zoe Rapid charge for a month, it was probably a really appealing package for someone who does my kind of mileage and had a home charging solution. 215 mile range. It’s just out of a lot of people’s reach price wise.
That being said my mum does around 15,000 miles a year so makes me feel like I don’t drive at all.
My dad (who lives elsewhere), on the other hand, works from home, has 3 cars.
His “daily” clocked up just 900 miles, his weekend car clocked up 2.5k, and the shed clocked up just 82 miles
Edited by VS02 on Thursday 15th September 04:59
I've gone the other way. My daily used to sit all week as I cycled to work and only be used for social stuff, now it's doing 30k+ a year pounding up and down the M4 to work and back. The classic Mini I picked up during lockdown is doing decent mileage too, 1500 last year and heading towards 1k this year too. It's balanced out by my mum's car having done 900 miles in the 4 years she had had it, half of them by me! Realised it hadn't been serviced since she bought it and checked the oil, still golden brown but will change it anyway.
Each of our 3 does & wears low miles...
- 2016 RS3: ~4-5k miles p/a, mainly for solo drives, business miles and visiting my ageing parents. Used once a week on average, usually ~100 miles per time. Garaged and pampered. 26k odometer reading.
- 2017 Skoda Fabia: ~2.5-3k p/a, running local errands, used ~4 times per week - and hence low miles belie it being our most used. Lives on our terraced street and is a small damage magnet. 22k on the clock.
- 2013 VW T5 camper: ~3k miles p/a, does infrequent long runs which doesn't seem to trouble it. Retired from primary use but too special to sell and too expensive to replace like-for-like. Lives on-street due to size, pampered. 60k odometer.
All commuting done by bicycles and Teams!
- 2016 RS3: ~4-5k miles p/a, mainly for solo drives, business miles and visiting my ageing parents. Used once a week on average, usually ~100 miles per time. Garaged and pampered. 26k odometer reading.
- 2017 Skoda Fabia: ~2.5-3k p/a, running local errands, used ~4 times per week - and hence low miles belie it being our most used. Lives on our terraced street and is a small damage magnet.
22k on the clock. - 2013 VW T5 camper: ~3k miles p/a, does infrequent long runs which doesn't seem to trouble it. Retired from primary use but too special to sell and too expensive to replace like-for-like. Lives on-street due to size, pampered. 60k odometer.
All commuting done by bicycles and Teams!
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