What's the "sweet spot" age/mileage for a used car purchase?

[Chalk]

E38Ross said:

i see LOADS of cars pre "02-plate" cars every day.

pre "51"

[E38Ross]

Chalk said:

E38Ross said:

i see LOADS of cars pre "02-plate" cars every day.

pre "51"

Wouldn't pre 02 be cars on a 51 or earlier.... Making them 10+ years old? Considering the 12 plate is out.......

[Fox-]

A 10 year old Mondeo that gets chucked in the bin for want of a £500 clutch isn't dead because it was life expired or didn't last. It was simply a victim of our chronically low used car values.

Nobody throws planes, trains or buses in the bin at 10 years old - because they are worth enough to keep properly maintained and to simply replace anything that goes wrong.

[Rostfritt]

Fox- said:

A 10 year old Mondeo that gets chucked in the bin for want of a £500 clutch isn't dead because it was life expired or didn't last. It was simply a victim of our chronically low used car values.

Nobody throws planes, trains or buses in the bin at 10 years old - because they are worth enough to keep properly maintained and to simply replace anything that goes wrong.

That is a victim of the hours of labour it would take to fix it. A 10 year old Mondeo would be worth over 4x as much in the 3rd world where someone would spend all day taking it apart and fashioning a new clutch out of an old shoe or something. Then the car is good for another few years as a bush taxi. Trains and planes etc are designed for years of revenue service, with proper maintenance schedules making sure parts are replaced before they wear out.

Cars tend to decline in use as they get older, with some exceptions. Older cars are owned by people who can't justify a brand new car for their use. I put barely any miles on a nearly 50 year old car, if I needed to cover more miles I might consider something more modern.

[blearyeyedboy]

fozzymandeus said:

That's a logical point, but the psychology of spending your savings on a new and disposable car every three years doesn't add up. It's easier to spend money from a bank because it doesn't feel like it's your hard graft that's worked to amass the funds.

Think: "I work hard, I deserve a new car."

A) Off to the bank for a shiny new car on a 3 year finance plan.
B) Drive the current car for three years and save.

If route B is followed, you have a chance to view your decision more objectively and you'll probably ask yourself: "Why do I need a new car? Mine works OK, I'll wait another year or three", and it becomes a 6 year gap and you spend three years driving an older car. Aggregate this type of thinking across a nation and you have a nation of older cars (and all kinds of other secondary impacts on the used car market as a result).

Take the following semi-fictional example.

I can save £300 a month for the car fund in three years. That'll make £10800.
I can borrow £10000 for £350 a month for 36 months. That £50/month might be a small price worth paying to drive the newer car I want 3 years earlier.
For some people, £50 a month isn't worth it. For some people, it is.
If you're not borrowing beyond your means- which is a critical thing here- and you decide it's worth it for your quality of life... why not? And if it's not worth it for you, then good for you for making that choice too.

(Let me put it another way. The average life expectancy for a UK born male is 78 years. Those 3 years make 3.8% of your life driving a car you don't want as much as the next one...)

I have bought 4 cars in my life. The 3rd was part financed and the rest were bought with cash. My 5th car will probably be part cash, part finance.

[james280779]

chris182 said:

Well I have a car with which is 24 years old with 120k on the clock and everything on it still works perfectly, so I beg to differ.

Some sensible points raised, there is no universal 'sweet spot', it very much depends on what you're buying and what your priorities are.

I have one which is 27 years old 125k and looks like it rolled out of a showroom last week. My other is 24 years old and less than 20k on the clock. I drove the first to scotland and back for fun a few weeks back and didnt break a sweat. would happily drive it thousands of miles with no worries.

[longblackcoat]

matthias73 said:

I've got a question regarding mileage.

Would you regard a 10 year old car with 30 thousand miles to be a bit suspect. I'm talking a family saloon or coupe here, so not a sports car.

Would I be better off looking at cars that seemed to do a decent mileage each year, rather than driven to morrisons 4 times a week with no propper time to warm up?

I ask this, because I'l probably need to get a new car or spend money on the current one within this year, and I'd rather not spend money on a car that has been battered so badly on the outside. (before I got staff parking, I had to park in a public carpark)

I'd avoid - daily usage is generally better for a car. The big caveat is how it's used; if it's got 20k purely urban miles on it, the sheer number of gearchanges it's had, the number of potholes bounced through, and the sheer volume of parking dinks picked up means that it would have a lower value in my eyes than a car with for more miles that's just whizzed up and down a motorway.

I'm currently disposing of an 04 Micra for my wife's aunt; it's one lady owner, 34k genuine miles, full history........and frankly a bit of a wreck. It stood, almost entirely unused (200 miles one year!) in a damp garage, and the front wheel bearings are knackered as a result. Same for the exhaust. Presumably they've just rusted in a cocoon of damp air and now they're disintegrating, so that's a bit of work for the MOT. It's pretty badly scraped as well (she wasn't very good at getting it out of the garage on the very rare occasions it was used) and the tyres have loads of tread but the sidewalls are cracking on two of them. To get it to showroom condition would be £600-700, and it's probably only worth £1000. Given that a scrapper will give me £300 for it (break it for parts - the mechanicals and interior are perfect), it's tempting to send it to the dumper in the sky. Realistically, I'll do the minimum required to get it through the MOT, clean it well, and get her £600, but it's a shame. Goes to show that mileage is no guarantee of great condition or value.

[Alfanatic]

My first car in the uk was a 1989 fiesta. 15 years old and 15k miles. The mechanical / cosmetic condition and maintenance requirements were more closely aligned to what I would expect from the age then the mileage, I.e it acted more like a 15 year old car of average mileage, less like a 15k mile car of average age. On the plus side, the interior was in great condition.

[Ari]

blearyeyedboy said:

Take the following semi-fictional example.

I can save £300 a month for the car fund in three years. That'll make £10800.
I can borrow £10000 for £350 a month for 36 months. That £50/month might be a small price worth paying to drive the newer car I want 3 years earlier.
For some people, £50 a month isn't worth it. For some people, it is.
If you're not borrowing beyond your means- which is a critical thing here- and you decide it's worth it for your quality of life... why not? And if it's not worth it for you, then good for you for making that choice too.

That's quite an interesting point. And you could add that, depending on the age and reliability of the older car whilst he's saving up, his £50/month in interest might be saving him from some hefty bills on the old car. Plus, given recent advances in efficiency, his new car might be saving him money on fuel and road tax.

I've always been finance averse and always paid cash, I hate paying interest. But that's quite a compelling way of looking at it.

[Ari]

Alfanatic said:

My first car in the uk was a 1989 fiesta. 15 years old and 15k miles. The mechanical / cosmetic condition and maintenance requirements were more closely aligned to what I would expect from the age then the mileage, I.e it acted more like a 15 year old car of average mileage, less like a 15k mile car of average age. On the plus side, the interior was in great condition.

Yup, that's my thinking. A higher mileage newer car is likely to feel newer than an older lower mileage car.

So to use your Fiesta as a great example, a seven year old 30,000 mile Fiesta would have felt a lot newer than your 15 year old 15,000 mile car.

[excel monkey]

Fox- said:

A 10 year old Mondeo that gets chucked in the bin for want of a £500 clutch isn't dead because it was life expired or didn't last. It was simply a victim of our chronically low used car values.

Nobody throws planes, trains or buses in the bin at 10 years old - because they are worth enough to keep properly maintained and to simply replace anything that goes wrong.

This.

High labour rates and parts prices also contribute to the shorter useful economic life of cars in this country.

In the US, used cars hold a greater proportion of their value (for a number of reasons - lower speed limits, big engines in low states of tune, no road salt in the southern states, and less-stringent roadworthiness tests in some states) I'd say the life expectancy out there is probably more like 15 yrs / 200k miles.

In answer to the OP's original question. I'd say the sweet spot is more like 12-18 months. You get a good percentage saving relative to the age, the car is still current, and have the option to extend the manufacturers warranty if you wish.

Edited by excel monkey on Friday 27th April 09:22

Edited by excel monkey on Friday 27th April 09:35

[LuS1fer]

I'd say 4-5 years old and around 50k on the clock.

Lots of depreciation done, any issues resolved, sufficiently lived in to avoid becoming precious about it being "new" but new enough that it will polish up and look good. At this age, you can also look at performance or high spec cars you might not otherwise be able to afford or run.

You can also get 3 years out of it and still get a respectable price back if you fancy a change.

[Johnboy Mac]

excel monkey said:

In answer to the OP's original question. I'd say the sweet spot is more like 12-18 months. You get a good percentage saving relative to the age, the car is still current, and have the option to extend the manufacturers warranty if you wish.

Hard to argue against that school of thought too. There's a big appeal to owning a current model with a manufacuturers warranty for a lot of people, providing of course they can justify/afford the purchase price.

[anonymous-user]

E38Ross said:

Ozzie Osmond said:

.... which bit of "rough rules of thumb" are you finding hard to understand?

are you saying all cars run trouble-free to 100,000 and beyond with nothing but fluids?

i'm saying cars with under 100k can be more trouble-some than cars with well over 100k miles.

most cars these days well maintained will go well past 100k; to suggest they generally only last 10yrs/100k is crap.

i see LOADS of cars pre "02-plate" cars every day.

The 10 year/100k miles idea is normally held by people that know f' all about cars. Read into that what you will

[Pommygranite]

Complete random guess but 4/5 years/ 48/60k miles is when quite a few good cars become affordable to the masses - I figure this is because 48/60k miles is when major services falls due and leasing/loans end.

Still new, still fresh, affordable and likely the model is still being made.

[excel monkey]

St John Smythe said:

The 10 year/100k miles idea is normally held by people that know f' all about cars. Read into that what you will

I think it was valid 30 years ago, when rustproofing techniques were not as good. It was considered a bold statement of confidence when manufacturers started putting 6 digit odometers in their cars in the late 70s and early 80s.

[obob]

In owning over 20 cars in ten years of driving I've only bought one car with under 100k on it and that was the Micra my dad bought me when I passed. I'd say 100k is the sweet spot as all depreciation is done, all major items usually replaced - clutch etc. and you can get bargains because there is less of a market so sellers tend to struggle.

[farrendahl]

I'm beliver on buy on condition, ignore the mileage and the age. If the car has been looked after and has the records to back it up then to hell with the mileage. I've seen enough three year old dogs with only say 30k on the clock to know that if the servicing proof isn't there to back it up it won't make a blind bit of difference.

Take my own car for example, it's a ten year old MG ZT-T 190, impeccibly and obsessivly looked after 136000 miles on the clock and by far the best £525 I've ever spent and I'd buy the same again in a heartbeat.

[Hugo a Gogo]

mileage is such a poor indicator

my focus did about 200 thousand km in two years up and down the autobahn and was still relatively fresh, the last 60 thousand round town and commuting over the last 5 years have really hammered it though

[RizzoTheRat]

Ari said:

Yup, that's my thinking. A higher mileage newer car is likely to feel newer than an older lower mileage car.

So to use your Fiesta as a great example, a seven year old 30,000 mile Fiesta would have felt a lot newer than your 15 year old 15,000 mile car.

I'm with you there, I bought my current car at 18 months old and 45,000 miles for about 65% of new cost, and my bike at 18 months and 36,000 miles for around 40% of new cost.
I'll probably keep both until they become oo expensive to maintain (last 2 cars were 196,000 miles before knackered radius arm bearings and 140,000 miles before the heater matrix started leaking, plus 78000 miles on the bike before the gearbox needed an overhaul.)