New medium sized estate car options

[The Surveyor]

My current daily is a 62 plate Volvo V60 diesel which I've owned from new. It's been superb from day one, spacious enough, 100% reliable, presentable, and excellent 55mpg plus economy over the last 154,000 miles.

I'm now thinking it maybe the right time to start considering buying it's replacement, before anything starts to go wrong on the V60 and after sitting behind the same steering wheel for 25k miles every year my head is starting to be turned.

Options are buy a very nearly new replacement for around £25k, or go with a lease on something brand new. The existing Volvo would be worth circa £3,500 - £4k and would be traded-in, or sold for a deposit. Long-list includes 3 Series Touring, C Class or E Class Estate, new V60 or V90, maximum 2.0l diesel, decent economy as my mileage will stay at 25,000 miles per year.

If I buy a nearly new, I'd be putting circa £10k cash in with the trade-in and funding the rest from a loan, or the alternative would be a lease.

Can anybody help with the maths, would I be better off taking a lease on something new with it's full warranty in which case are there any decent deals out there which are still effective at high-mileage? Has there been any decent deals as a comparison to buying nearly new?

[Fast Bug]

Santander are pretty good with Volvo leasing at the moment

www.santanderconsumer.co.uk/123contracthireoffer/

Although January should see new lease deals, who knows if they'll be good or bad though. E Class hasn't been all that cheap on leasing of late, probably worth having a look at the lease thread and you'll see some of the deals that have been around.

Leasing versus outright purchase is a whole different thing though, you'd need to work out if you want a car for 2-3 years then go again, or something more long term like you have now

[ninjag]

Would leasing not be quite expensive at 25k miles per year?

I'd buy nearly new, perhaps a year old so a decent chunk of depreciation is already away and you've still got two years manufacturers warranty left.

[ZX10R NIN]

I'd say take a look at a Kia Cee'D GT Line S:

https://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201...

Ford Focus Titanium X

https://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201...

D3 V60

https://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201...

308 GT

https://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201...

https://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201...

508 GT

https://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201...

[The Surveyor]

ninjag said:

Would leasing not be quite expensive at 25k miles per year?

I'd buy nearly new, perhaps a year old so a decent chunk of depreciation is already away and you've still got two years manufacturers warranty left.

Yes, the mileage allowance is quite a killer on a lease although it does look to vary from offer to offer. 12 month old is looking favourable.

[A900ss]

I was in a similar situation recently and I worked out that ‘buy’ was cheaper than ‘lease’ for me (30k miles a year).

I was looking at nearly new but the discounts available on brand new cars swayed me. I guess they can’t sell diesel at the moment so need to induce people by strong prices. I bought a list price £35k Passat for £25k earlier this year.

And before someone says it’ll be worth nothing secondhand when I come to sell as its diesel, it’ll have done 150k in 5 years so the car allowance would have more than paid it off.

The best price I could find was through Orange Wheels.

Either way, best of luck.

[The Surveyor]

A900ss said:

I was in a similar situation recently and I worked out that ‘buy’ was cheaper than ‘lease’ for me (30k miles a year).

I was looking at nearly new but the discounts available on brand new cars swayed me. I guess they can’t sell diesel at the moment so need to induce people by strong prices. I bought a list price £35k Passat for £25k earlier this year.

And before someone says it’ll be worth nothing secondhand when I come to sell as its diesel, it’ll have done 150k in 5 years so the car allowance would have more than paid it off.

The best price I could find was through Orange Wheels.

Either way, best of luck.

Thanks for that, that is exactly how I ended up with the V60. Volvo dealer needed to rack up their sales volume to click a bonus payment from Volvo (or so the sales guy told me) and had 6 pre-registered V60 D2's available all with a similar spec and mileage (mine had 19 miles showing when I picked it up) and had a screen price of £19k down from £29k. 6 years and 154,000 miles later it's worth £3,500 which I'm perfectly happy with.

May take a look around the dealers in the New Year, see what stock of old-model Audi A4 / A6, 3 series, or Passat are available. I do fancy another Volvo but don't want another series 1 V60 and there doesn't seam to be much discount on the new one, actually the V90 looks better value given the extra spec and size.

Lots to think about, cheers.