Estate Car - Lease / Nearly New / Old

[MonzaEvo]

After spending the last 7 years as a one (small) car family living a few minutes from the tube – we’re now in the countryside, and would like a second car for general family duties. Eyes are on a Volvo V60 Petrol Hybrid….. with the options being:

• Lease a new one – There’s a few V60 B4 Hybrids in stock for £390 a month (12 months down) on 8000 miles a year for 3 years
• Buy a 2-4 year old one for circa £25k.
• Go older and cheaper and look at past models for circa £10k. Obviously not going to be hybrid.

Previous cars have been kept for long term, so leasing is very alien to me – current Yaris has been owned outright since 2013 and still going strong. Unknown yearly mileage, also puts doubt in the lease idea.

Petrol (hybrid) seems more suited to expected usage

Happy with any alternative recommended makes/models…. And thoughts on the above

Rgds
Jonathan

[FamousPheasant]

Leases work best when you are not fussed about the particular car, chase the deal and like to change car every 2- 3 years. Most deals are currently on EVs. That lease isn't great in my opinion at nearly over 18k over the 3 years.

I always try and compare the total costs between the options. You need to consider the depreciation of the used examples (I would say the 25k car will be worth 15k in 3 years over 30k miles), the cost of borrowing money - or the opportunity cost of not having 25k in a 5% ISA (for instance) if buying cash. The rest of the running costs will be the same when comparing the same car.

The big unknown is repairs out of warranty on the older cars. You could probably extend the warranty on the 2-4 year old example to give you a fixed cost and gives you a fairer comparison.

You can then determine the costs of the lease vs an older example and work out if that's worth it to you.

All that said, if you plan on keeping the car for many years, buying rather than leasing is absolutely the way to go.