The Joy of Running an Old Shed

[Challo]

Digby said:

One of the wealthiest people I know who I admit now owns a few super cars, some old classics and a helicopter etc was hacking around in an old BMW which cost as much as he probably earned in an hour not too long ago and was doing so for ages. He had no interest in anything else. Things only changed when his friend convinced him he really needed to live a little and spend some of his money. Even then he would buy something with a view to it being an investment and still had little interest.

He let his friend borrow his Ferrari and Audi R8 for over a year because he wasn’t bothered about driving them.

I’m nowhere near in that league financially but my last few new cars had 20 to 30k price tags. I went from purchasing to leasing to really not caring. It’s also a social thing for me. This weekend for example several of us met up to do some work on our sheds at our workshop.


My mate in this picture for example working on one of four or five sheds he owns was a performance car enthusiast. A mint GTE16v, Sierra Cosworth etc back in the day, but he too no longer cares even though he could easily get something.

He now enjoys the fact he can pick up a cheap TDi and pay 30 quid a year tax and do 50 mpg. If we went back to having new cars, a massive part of our social circle would be wiped out.

Exactly like my friends father in-law. Property developer and just about to sell his last development for about £15m before he retires. A few years ago he had a Nissan GTR tucked up in the garage, but often you would see him pottering about in his daughters shed of a VW Polo. Not fussed about what people thought of him.

[dgswk]

Joey Deacon said:

To further go against your "People only drive sheds because they can't afford a new car" argument I am actually entitled to a company car through work. If I wanted to I could go onto the company website and order a brand new car today. It would turn up and I wouldn't need to Tax, Insure or even worry about servicing it.

Lots of people at work go for this option as it works for them. After three years a lot of them look in worse condition than my shed, they just hand them back and get another one.

But, in reality it is not for free and I choose to take the car allowance instead and drive a shed. Why? because by losing the allowance and paying the BIK tax that middle of the range Golf will be costing me £500 a month.

As a lot of people have explained, yes we could easily afford a new car but our personal priorities are different and we would rather spend the money on other stuff.

I have been there with brand new expensive cars, and once the novelty has worn off and it gets dirty it is just a car. I used to buy into the whole "drivers car" nonsense and consume every review and join the message board of the next "best thing ever" car. I would get all excited, buy one only to be ultimately disappointed as it never lived up to the hype. I would then be on a constant treadmill of getting a new car every 18 months, never satisfied with what I had.

If you own a shed your expectations are pretty low and hence you are never disappointed. I am far more happy that a car I paid £1200 for four years ago works perfectly, has never had an issue and costs £30 in road tax and gives 55MPG all day long.

100% this. Until very recently (last week) I'd been shedding in an old Mondeo and an Audi A6, over the past 4 years, spending the opt-out company car allowance on a new 911. Shed + 911, or a nice company A6 / 5 Series. Closer than you think with BiK as mentioned above.

I found having a daily shed was liberating and bangernomics can give you opportunities to spend the cash on something you really want. In my case, it made no sense to use the 911 as a daily for a number of reasons. Firstly, putting 20,000 miles a year on a 911 would be financial madness, secondly, with those miles it would cease being special and thirdly - turning up to work (or a customer's) in a £100k sports car can get a small minority people all huffy and making stupid unfounded assumptions about you.

I think most of all I enjoyed the anonimity of the shed.

[Sheepshanks]

miken2k8 said:

i didn't say that just you wouldn't chose a shed over a new one if you could afford it simple as

I've blundered into shed territory with a Merc which I bought at 5mths old only because new ones were on 9mths lead time when I needed it (early 2005). So it's now coming up to 17yrs old. It's worth a few hundred quid.

Without being billy large potatoes about it I could effortlessly buy a new replacement. I just can't bring myself to spend £40K+ on a new one and then watch it depreciate.

I will admit I'm somewhat jealous of people who are bonkers enough to do that!

[cedrichn]

I am wondering: what is your view on smartphone? Which one do you have?
Trying to see if there is any similarities....or if you spend the money you saved into phones :P

(I had Blackberry, loved them. iPhone, liked it. Then back to Blackberry - was a huge fan of the keyboard. Then, kept on losing and breaking them, and not so much "into it" anymore, so I just get the £200 ones from a "good" brand: now on Sony Xperia)

[v15ben]

I've got the phone equivalent of a shed, a £150 Motorola (now 3 years old) that refuses to die, but does everything I need well enough.

Think I'm losing my grasp on the shed lifestyle though. Going to swap the phone for a decent iPhone in the summer and sold the Micra Shed for a £6K car earlier in the year. Think I'm doing it wrong.

[Ryyy]

cedrichn said:

I am wondering: what is your view on smartphone? Which one do you have?
Trying to see if there is any similarities....or if you spend the money you saved into phones :P

(I had Blackberry, loved them. iPhone, liked it. Then back to Blackberry - was a huge fan of the keyboard. Then, kept on losing and breaking them, and not so much "into it" anymore, so I just get the £200 ones from a "good" brand: now on Sony Xperia)

£150 samsung from argos, ticks all the boxes and is currently smashed up from work but will get replaced with my brothers old one till that breaks as well. Dont do fancy phones and fancy phones dont do construction sites

[Sheepshanks]

cedrichn said:

I am wondering: what is your view on smartphone? Which one do you have?
Trying to see if there is any similarities....or if you spend the money you saved into phones :P

(I had Blackberry, loved them. iPhone, liked it. Then back to Blackberry - was a huge fan of the keyboard. Then, kept on losing and breaking them, and not so much "into it" anymore, so I just get the £200 ones from a "good" brand: now on Sony Xperia)

Another advantage of a shed (at least my Merc one) is it had a swapable holder in the armrest for older phones that integrated into the COMAND system so charged it and used the external aerial. (Not sure I believe the aerial part - the Nokia 6310 holder had a physical connection to the aerial, but the Blackberry didn't - supposedly it used inductive coupling).

But we get phones from work anyway - they replace them on 2yr cycles and will order whatever we ask for. The phone holder takes a bluetooth module so any phone integrates fine - I use iPhone 11 now.

[Cascade360]

cedrichn said:

I am wondering: what is your view on smartphone? Which one do you have?
Trying to see if there is any similarities....or if you spend the money you saved into phones :P

(I had Blackberry, loved them. iPhone, liked it. Then back to Blackberry - was a huge fan of the keyboard. Then, kept on losing and breaking them, and not so much "into it" anymore, so I just get the £200 ones from a "good" brand: now on Sony Xperia)

Thing is, this assumes that owning a shed is solely a financial decision. It isn't, for me at least. I drive a shed cause I like old cars, and I like variety (it is much easier to chop and change cheap cars every 6/12 months than it is a brand new car).

[Baked_bean]

Reading this thread in the past has been interesting, as i appreciate driving an old shed occasionally and try not to get wrapped up in the new is better thing.

But I see it has now descended in typical PH fashion with loads of inverse snobbery about how they could afford a Veyron but chose a Vectra estate instead. I understand but it all just seems abit snobby, especially saying you cant see why people spend money on cars on a website about cars. I currently drive a sheddy 5 series estate which is fine, but I am not against spending on a nice car that I can enjoy and cherish also.

For the record, if i had the money I would definitely have a GT3.

[cedrichn]

v15ben said:

I've got the phone equivalent of a shed, a £150 Motorola (now 3 years old) that refuses to die, but does everything I need well enough.

Think I'm losing my grasp on the shed lifestyle though. Going to swap the phone for a decent iPhone in the summer and sold the Micra Shed for a £6K car earlier in the year. Think I'm doing it wrong.

You will come back, soon or later

[Arnie Cunningham]

I can't speak for everyone, but I know in my case:

a. I am a tight arse. I don't see new as being good value.
b. I do all my own maintenance - and I do take a bit of pride in keeping cars that many would have scrapped roadworthy & reliable.
c. I think that environment impact on manufacturing new cars is astronomical. So I prefer to keep older ones going longer.

Not trying to hold off 'lecky cars or anything - I think electric is the way forward for cars. But just do it intelligently, don't throw a perfectly good car our "just because", throw it out because it's come to the end of it's life.

So I don't think I'm being snobby about it, I'm just doing what suits me and evangalising the benefits of it. And I think I can do it all while still being a bit of a petrol head - it just happens they're older cars. Certainly 2 of the cars in the fleet I intend to keep until I die - the V8 Landrover and the Ultima. (32 and 24 years old respectively).

[V6todayTurboManana]

bearman68 said:

I'd prefer to pay someone to paint, and to run a shed rather than a 'nice' car.

I love running sheds. I'm currently experimenting with finding the cheapest car I can, and seeing what that's like. [b]I've bought a 2.0 petrol Focus for £70, got 12 months MOT on it, and I've been running that around. [\b]
What a revelation that car is. It's absolutely brilliant. I really like it. I have forgotten how bloody good the Mk1 Focus was (is). I'm running around in a car I love for the price of a tyre.
That's me winning at life I think.
If I wanted to spend big money, I think I'd buy a glider, where extra performance actually makes a difference to the outcome of a journey. But I'm not good enough a pilot for that just yet.

Did you miss a zero out on that price. If not, then where did you find a bargain like that and have you posted photos.

[HJG]

My shed gave up last week on the M25.
307HDi that cost me £600 3 years ago. Something's never been quite right about it. Odd sporadic behaviour from the engine, mostly with the boost. 90% of of the time it was fine. For the last year it has been happier running without the MAF and never threw a light with it disconnected. For over a year it has been telling me the diesel additive fluid is at minimum level.
Purchased car on 110 000 miles. Changed oil when purchased and ended on 165 000.
Was on the outside lane by Junction 9. Suddenly the engine made a noise I can only explain as somebody dropping a handful of cutlery into a metal sink. Couldn't see anything behind me due to the smoke. I was determined not to be that guy who ruins everybody's morning by breaking down on the M25. After battling across 4 lanes to get off the motorway I managed to get off at J9. Went for one last stab of the throttle pedal. Noise was horrific and every warning light came on including ones I'd never seen. To top it off, the final message was 'anti pollution fault'. Car was recovered after recovery team amusingly tried a can of easy start. Timing belt still on. Car has oil. Suspect turbo has been ingested by the engine.

Scrap now offering £320 which I thought is good. Everything works on the car which is a first for my Peugeot experiences.
I'm actually relieved as I knew it was going to give up at some point and now it's happened. Also I found my soul being withdrawn from me every time I sat in that 307. Never again.

[Digby]

Challo said:

Exactly like my friends father in-law. Property developer and just about to sell his last development for about £15m before he retires. A few years ago he had a Nissan GTR tucked up in the garage, but often you would see him pottering about in his daughters shed of a VW Polo. Not fussed about what people thought of him.

A friend of a friend sadly no longer with us did really rather well for himself owning his own garage. They did servicing, mechanical jobs, tuning, bodywork etc and despite having a few toys (Cosworth powered P100 being one) and something luxurious for the odd weekend away, all day every day he would be thrashing about in 80s Skoda Rapids or Estelles. He loved them and had several. He paid peanuts for them. The joke at the time was that if you ever saw one coming round a corner on two wheels, you could guarantee it would be him.

He would happily rip bits from them to make a “good one” out of bad; including engines and boxes. I doubt he paid more than a few hundred quid for any of them and this was when Skoda jokes were at their peak!

He also never felt the need to tell anyone he owned a Bentley etc and lived in a prime location in a lovely detached bungalow; you only ever found out from others and if you asked him about his Skoda daily, he would just say “Don’t knock them until you have tried them”

[cedrichn]

Baked_bean said:

Reading this thread in the past has been interesting, as i appreciate driving an old shed occasionally and try not to get wrapped up in the new is better thing.

But I see it has now descended in typical PH fashion with loads of inverse snobbery about how they could afford a Veyron but chose a Vectra estate instead. I understand but it all just seems abit snobby, especially saying you cant see why people spend money on cars on a website about cars. I currently drive a sheddy 5 series estate which is fine, but I am not against spending on a nice car that I can enjoy and cherish also.

For the record, if i had the money I would definitely have a GT3.

I think the snobbery is much more towards "new-ish expensive boring cars" than towards "interesting cars". If I was rich, I would daily a Jag XJ V8, not a C5 (and not a new Golf / BMW / SUV / ....)

I tried the analogy with smartphones, as they are similar to cars nowadays: you have some cheap ones, and some expensive ones. And every 6 months or so, a new one is out. And, some people judge their neighbor's success based on their phone, some other people feel they need the latest one to have a social life, while some others can't be bothered. Same as cars, no? Hence why I was wondering what shedist have in their pocket :P

[anonymous-user]

HJG said:

My shed gave up last week on the M25.
307HDi that cost me £600 3 years ago. Something's never been quite right about it. Odd sporadic behaviour from the engine, mostly with the boost. 90% of of the time it was fine. For the last year it has been happier running without the MAF and never threw a light with it disconnected. For over a year it has been telling me the diesel additive fluid is at minimum level.
Purchased car on 110 000 miles. Changed oil when purchased and ended on 165 000.
Was on the outside lane by Junction 9. Suddenly the engine made a noise I can only explain as somebody dropping a handful of cutlery into a metal sink. Couldn't see anything behind me due to the smoke. I was determined not to be that guy who ruins everybody's morning by breaking down on the M25. After battling across 4 lanes to get off the motorway I managed to get off at J9. Went for one last stab of the throttle pedal. Noise was horrific and every warning light came on including ones I'd never seen. To top it off, the final message was 'anti pollution fault'. Car was recovered after recovery team amusingly tried a can of easy start. Timing belt still on. Car has oil. Suspect turbo has been ingested by the engine.

Scrap now offering £320 which I thought is good. Everything works on the car which is a first for my Peugeot experiences.
I'm actually relieved as I knew it was going to give up at some point and now it's happened. Also I found my soul being withdrawn from me every time I sat in that 307. Never again.

So you did 55K miles for a total cost of £280! Is that it for shedding now?

[Cascade360]

Baked_bean said:

Reading this thread in the past has been interesting, as i appreciate driving an old shed occasionally and try not to get wrapped up in the new is better thing.

But I see it has now descended in typical PH fashion with loads of inverse snobbery about how they could afford a Veyron but chose a Vectra estate instead. I understand but it all just seems abit snobby, especially saying you cant see why people spend money on cars on a website about cars. I currently drive a sheddy 5 series estate which is fine, but I am not against spending on a nice car that I can enjoy and cherish also.

For the record, if i had the money I would definitely have a GT3.

To be clear, I don't think people are saying if they had infinite money they would still run around in a £600 Vectra. Thing is, none of us have unlimited money, and we would rather allocate the money we do have to pensions/savings/other cars/women/drugs/rock and roll or whatever. Even if it wouldn't be a hardship to go out and buy/finance a new car.

[anonymous-user]

Baked_bean said:

Reading this thread in the past has been interesting, as i appreciate driving an old shed occasionally and try not to get wrapped up in the new is better thing.

But I see it has now descended in typical PH fashion with loads of inverse snobbery about how they could afford a Veyron but chose a Vectra estate instead. I understand but it all just seems abit snobby, especially saying you cant see why people spend money on cars on a website about cars. I currently drive a sheddy 5 series estate which is fine, but I am not against spending on a nice car that I can enjoy and cherish also.

For the record, if i had the money I would definitely have a GT3.

You may read inverse snobbery into it but in my case I just simply couldn't care less, whatever people do with their money is of no concern to me, if you want to run up debt of 50 grand knock yourself out. Lest we forget the title of the thread is about the joy of running an old shed, not one-upmanship or inverse snobbery. It seems to escape most on here that shedding is a choice for some, not done out of necessity due to poverty and yes it is enjoyable.

[HJG]

Joey Deacon said:

So you did 55K miles for a total cost of £280! Is that it for shedding now?

Hell no! Just no more 307s. I fancy something slightly odd, preferably diesel without DPF and under £1K. Although petrol will widen the opportunities.
Although I do like the idea of spending no more than £500 and just seeing how far it goes

[Jaguar steve]

Baked_bean said:

...with loads of inverse snobbery about how they could afford a Veyron but chose a Vectra estate instead...

That's not reverse snobbery though - that's a natural reaction to the thinly veiled ostentatious viewpoint that unless you're driving or wearing or living in or phoning on the best or newest or most expensive option you've somehow failed at the Game of Life, which of course completely ignores the fact that many choose not to attempt keeping up in the Game of Life, not because it's beyond their means or abilities but because they recognise the shallow materialistic charade it frequently is and prefer not to have any involvement in the Game in the first place.

Somebody might well be able to afford the best or newest or most expensive whatever but that doesn't automatically mean they're obliged to have it.