Does your choice of car reflect how much you drive?
Discussion
Forgive me OP, but isn't that exactly the reason why you would want a performance car?
The less commuting miles the better... More miles/money to be spent on actually enjoying the car where and when you want to.
I cut my commute from 50 miles per day to 16 miles per day and still do 17k-ish miles per year. I thought it would drop substantially but if anything it has made me enjoy taking the car out on longer/further day trips on a weekend to enjoy it. Whereas previously, after doing ~250 commuting miles per week I couldn't be arsed going anywhere far on a weekend.
The less commuting miles the better... More miles/money to be spent on actually enjoying the car where and when you want to.
I cut my commute from 50 miles per day to 16 miles per day and still do 17k-ish miles per year. I thought it would drop substantially but if anything it has made me enjoy taking the car out on longer/further day trips on a weekend to enjoy it. Whereas previously, after doing ~250 commuting miles per week I couldn't be arsed going anywhere far on a weekend.
I drive a fast car and I do < 8000 miles per year, mainly town driving and dual carriageway stretches. Very rarely sees a motorway or a nice country road. I still need a car though so I'm happy to pay a bit extra to have something I enjoy that doesn't really get that much use. In fact, I took the family work horse to work today as I'd parked it in front of the daily and couldn't be bothered to move them around.
I don't commute and tend to have 2 nice cars, doing about 18K miles in both of them together. I just go for rides or do long distance driving in Europe. None of the cars is shopping trolley. I usually drive minimum 20 miles one way, don't do short trips around the corner.
Buy a car you will enjoy and don't think about commute as justification what to buy.
Buy a car you will enjoy and don't think about commute as justification what to buy.
kelevraz said:
is there a POINT in me getting another high performance car?
Without wanting to sound unkind, I'm not sure you've actually had one, let alone getting another.If you don't need to drive for work, spend the money on something a bit more bonkers and enjoy it while you can.
Integroo said:
I no longer have a car. I want one, but I have moved to London and can't see the point. I would drive it every other weekend, and would be paying 1500 quid a year in insurance for anything mildly interesting for the privilege, on top of tax and maintenance. Can't see the point. Although buying something interesting and depreciation free is tempting...(Elise?).
Just make sure that you tuck those savings away so that when you eventually bail London you can treat yourself. For me, Living in London meant never having to compromise on my choice of car. I never had to consider utility and was free to buy the totally impractical cars that I really wanted. Integroo said:
I no longer have a car. I want one, but I have moved to London and can't see the point. I would drive it every other weekend, and would be paying 1500 quid a year in insurance for anything mildly interesting for the privilege, on top of tax and maintenance. Can't see the point. Although buying something interesting and depreciation free is tempting...(Elise?).
I lived in London for ten years. Absolutely no point owning a car- bikes yes!Personally, I'd always have two.
One beater, 4x4 or cheap hatch depending on where you are and your usage case, mainly for driving around in the winter, running to the shops. I have a Jimny and love it, to me it is just the ultimate 'no f
ks given' motoring, you can park it wherever, rattle it off of kerbs & speed bumps & just in general abuse the hell out of it without really worrying that you are damaging it, and, when you do, replacement parts are dirt cheap.
And a nice car, having the beater means you can go for a less compromised 'nice' car, run it on summer tyres year round, only take it out when you know you will be traversing nice roads. For me I have had a MX5 for this purpose, but have recently replaced it with a bike.
One beater, 4x4 or cheap hatch depending on where you are and your usage case, mainly for driving around in the winter, running to the shops. I have a Jimny and love it, to me it is just the ultimate 'no f
ks given' motoring, you can park it wherever, rattle it off of kerbs & speed bumps & just in general abuse the hell out of it without really worrying that you are damaging it, and, when you do, replacement parts are dirt cheap. And a nice car, having the beater means you can go for a less compromised 'nice' car, run it on summer tyres year round, only take it out when you know you will be traversing nice roads. For me I have had a MX5 for this purpose, but have recently replaced it with a bike.
DonkeyApple said:
Just make sure that you tuck those savings away so that when you eventually bail London you can treat yourself. For me, Living in London meant never having to compromise on my choice of car. I never had to consider utility and was free to buy the totally impractical cars that I really wanted.
Indeed - I am just worried I will never leave! Sa Calobra said:
I lived in London for ten years. Absolutely no point owning a car- bikes yes!
Indeed. I don't need it. Before I moved I told myself I might use it for weekend travel and things, but frankly I am so exhausted every weekend (and working half of them) that the idea of long day trips is not so appealing! I've done 25,000 miles + per year in a 2.5 or 2.8 petrol BMWs for the past 3 years. It's been fun, albeit expensive. When fuel was 97.9ppl it was much more fun, but now filling up twice a week got galling, so I bought a 330d. The range helps out. I still have a petrol one for weekends though. 
I have a 130i as a daily, and my office is 80 miles away from my house.
Thankfully i work at home 2 days per week, and make use of a cheap hotel near to the office. I also have motorbikes so the car only gets used in the deepest, darkest winter.
It gets about 32mpg average, and only about 320 miles on a tank (so realistically getting 2x round trips to work and back would be tight).
I looked at getting a Civic 1.6 diesel instead, but the depreciation of the Civic wipes out the gain in fuel costs. Plus i'd miss the glorious N52 engine.
But the 130i does mean i'm reluctant to drive far. I used to be at Sherwood Pines regularly but it's a 100 mile round trip so that's about £20 in fuel. So i don't bother much now and road cycle from my house instead.
I had a 325d for a while and that was really good. Not as nice an engine as the 130i (obv!), but roughly double the fuel range for 20% extra cost to fill up. BUT it had problems and i spent so much on it that it wiped out more than the gain in fuel costs.
Ideally i'd have the 130i AND something mega economical. Plus something i could use when the roads are salty, but that's too expensive because of tax/insurance/etc.
Thankfully i work at home 2 days per week, and make use of a cheap hotel near to the office. I also have motorbikes so the car only gets used in the deepest, darkest winter.
It gets about 32mpg average, and only about 320 miles on a tank (so realistically getting 2x round trips to work and back would be tight).
I looked at getting a Civic 1.6 diesel instead, but the depreciation of the Civic wipes out the gain in fuel costs. Plus i'd miss the glorious N52 engine.
But the 130i does mean i'm reluctant to drive far. I used to be at Sherwood Pines regularly but it's a 100 mile round trip so that's about £20 in fuel. So i don't bother much now and road cycle from my house instead.
I had a 325d for a while and that was really good. Not as nice an engine as the 130i (obv!), but roughly double the fuel range for 20% extra cost to fill up. BUT it had problems and i spent so much on it that it wiped out more than the gain in fuel costs.
Ideally i'd have the 130i AND something mega economical. Plus something i could use when the roads are salty, but that's too expensive because of tax/insurance/etc.
For my daily car I'd say it absolutely does, I do about 12k a year but all of it is on the motorway and in stints of 130 miles at a time. Hence my daily car is an old E320 CDI, comfortable, economical, automatic and has a good spec for making it an easy drive.
If I doing short town drives, I certainly wouldn't have a diesel although with kids a car with that level of practicality helps. The likelihood is that I will replace the E Class with an S320/350 CDI as it's all about comfortable cruising.
My other cars are determined by what I like so there's no necessity to them.
Realistically if I was to consolidate all of my cars into one that had to do everything, I'd keep the comfort and spec but probably suck up the costs of cruising in a V8 (E55/E63 maybe).
If I doing short town drives, I certainly wouldn't have a diesel although with kids a car with that level of practicality helps. The likelihood is that I will replace the E Class with an S320/350 CDI as it's all about comfortable cruising.
My other cars are determined by what I like so there's no necessity to them.
Realistically if I was to consolidate all of my cars into one that had to do everything, I'd keep the comfort and spec but probably suck up the costs of cruising in a V8 (E55/E63 maybe).
Integroo said:
DonkeyApple said:
Just make sure that you tuck those savings away so that when you eventually bail London you can treat yourself. For me, Living in London meant never having to compromise on my choice of car. I never had to consider utility and was free to buy the totally impractical cars that I really wanted.
Indeed - I am just worried I will never leave! 95JO said:
Forgive me OP, but isn't that exactly the reason why you would want a performance car?
The less commuting miles the better... More miles/money to be spent on actually enjoying the car where and when you want to.
I agree with this. I walk to work and my local supermarket is also within walking distance so I don't need a car. That allowed me to finally buy an impractical sports car which mainly just sees weekend fun journeys. The money I saved on commuting pays for the car upkeep and the impracticallity is not an issue nowadays.The less commuting miles the better... More miles/money to be spent on actually enjoying the car where and when you want to.
I bought my 'nice car' intending to have it as the single all rounder (F Type) but then leased a daily about 4 months later in the midst of the awful winter we had a couple of years ago.
I managed to get in on the cheap Skoda Octavia VRS lease deals and love mine to bits. Sort of fits your bill as a hot hatch but it can be sensible and has an enormous boot. I got the petrol as I won't entertain diesel, it does over 40mpg comfortably on longer trips and my long term average is about 34mpg. That being said, now its summer I use that and the jag interchangeably so have racked up miles on both. If I could only keep one car it would be the Skoda, it's just more useful and a great all rounder.
ETA - my commute is about 12 miles per day, with about 2k business miles PA on top of that. I rack the miles up in the Jag in the summer doing road trips etc, so it still does around 6k miles PA.
I managed to get in on the cheap Skoda Octavia VRS lease deals and love mine to bits. Sort of fits your bill as a hot hatch but it can be sensible and has an enormous boot. I got the petrol as I won't entertain diesel, it does over 40mpg comfortably on longer trips and my long term average is about 34mpg. That being said, now its summer I use that and the jag interchangeably so have racked up miles on both. If I could only keep one car it would be the Skoda, it's just more useful and a great all rounder.
ETA - my commute is about 12 miles per day, with about 2k business miles PA on top of that. I rack the miles up in the Jag in the summer doing road trips etc, so it still does around 6k miles PA.
Edited by Shrimpvende on Tuesday 14th May 13:15
i tried running 2 cars, a big wafty volvo for my london commute and something more interesting for the weekend
the interesting car never got used (to much hassle to move the volvo) and after 4 weeks of driving the volvo i wanted to drive into a wall to inject some sort of emotion about the experience
so for my commute into london i have used an MR2, S4, CTR, STi PPP, RS4 and more recently R32 (5 years) 2 RS3 (5 years between them) GLA45 (3 years in September)
cant make my mind up over a C63s or a model 3 performance for my next city runabout
the interesting car never got used (to much hassle to move the volvo) and after 4 weeks of driving the volvo i wanted to drive into a wall to inject some sort of emotion about the experience
so for my commute into london i have used an MR2, S4, CTR, STi PPP, RS4 and more recently R32 (5 years) 2 RS3 (5 years between them) GLA45 (3 years in September)
cant make my mind up over a C63s or a model 3 performance for my next city runabout
Depends on the commute. I'm lucky enough to drive over the cat and fiddle road every day. Very little traffic, lovely road to drive on (in good weather). Therefore when the suns out I take my Exige and enjoy it (other time I take my Fiesta ST). If I had a similar length commute in stop/start traffic I wouldn't be taking my Exige in spite of doing similar miles.
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