The Lemon Fool

From £20,000

Are they mad?

Well they all seem to by hybrids, which probably pushes the price up.

Scott.

It does seem a lot, but I would only add that my daughter has had a Yaris Hybrid for a few years and it is an impressively cheap car to run. I don't think they have ever been cheap to buy though.

MM

It is priced and sized to compete with the new Ford Puma.

It is amazing how adding a few inches onto the height adds so many extra costs - less aerodynamic so needs a larger engine for the same performance and then it needs better brakes etc, it all adds up.

Still have to keep up with the Joneses I guess.

I think time has caught up with us all. You can easily spend £20K on a Ford Fiesta these days, and that's just a 1 litre petrol Ecoboost.

It was never much cheaper to build a supermini than a five-seater mid-sized family car, anyway. And the smaller cars depreciate more slowly, which may be a compensation.

What matters, however, is the price you actually pay on the forecourt. There are false prices all over the place, and massive discounts very easily available.

FWIW, I love my Toyota (Auris estate, petrol) which I bought at 18 months old for barely ten grand, and from a main dealer too). After six years and 64K miles, not a single damn thing has gone wrong with it. Can Ford or VW match that?

BJ

Lanark wrote:It is priced and sized to compete with the new Ford Puma.

Yes, my neighbour's just got a new Puma. The Puma I remember was a tiny, fun, Fiesta-based coupe. ("Top Gear car of the year 1997" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R3QuH7z1Z1o)

The new one is a baby SUV, which just disappears among all the VW T-Rocs, Audi Q3s, Nissan Jukes etc ad nauseam.

Scott.

We brought our Yaris at three years old, and it's thirteen now. Never broken down, never gone wrong, just once a year services and MOT.

Stonge wrote:From £20,000

Are they mad?

But for the vast majority of new car 'buyers' the forecourt price is irrelevant.

All that matters is the monthly lease, PCP, etc. payment.

AF62 wrote:

Stonge wrote:From £20,000

Are they mad?

But for the vast majority of new car 'buyers' the forecourt price is irrelevant.

Not on this forum!

Lanark wrote:

AF62 wrote:

Stonge wrote:From £20,000

Are they mad?

But for the vast majority of new car 'buyers' the forecourt price is irrelevant.

Not on this forum!

But the manufacturers aren't aiming their marketing strategy at people on this forum...

ReallyVeryFoolish wrote:Mrs Soap has had a Yaris Hybrid four years now. It's a terrific little car. She'll keep it till the wheels fall off. Which could be a very long time indeed.

There's a couple of factors at play here - 1 The depreciating GBP which is forever pushing up the price of imported cars and the like. 2 Very few people pay the sticker price for a car now. Most people go into a dealership and the conversation goes "what can I have for £350 a month please"? The list prices of the cars reflects this. Naturally, large fleet buyers get huge discounts anyway so the forecourt price doesn't bother them.

RVF

She'll keep it till the wheels fall off. Hopefully until just before the wheels fall off!

ReallyVeryFoolish wrote:Most people go into a dealership and the conversation goes "what can I have for £350 a month please"?

Or for a Yaris £1,400 down and £225 a month.

bungeejumper wrote:I think time has caught up with us all. You can easily spend £20K on a Ford Fiesta these days, and that's just a 1 litre petrol Ecoboost.

£1,200 down and £150 a month would get you one of those, so the Yaris is expensive in comparison.

AF62 wrote:Or for a Yaris £1,400 down and £225 a month.

bungeejumper wrote:I think time has caught up with us all. You can easily spend £20K on a Ford Fiesta these days, and that's just a 1 litre petrol Ecoboost.

£1,200 down and £150 a month would get you one of those, so the Yaris is expensive in comparison.

I never did quite get the hang of PCP, but why would the differential between those two quotes be so large if the difference in the windscreen sticker price was so slim? (In this case, £2 to £3K at most.)

Think I'll stick to buying 1-2 year old cars with a bank loan. The deal on my Auris was £2,500 down (trade in) and five years at £140 a month, after which I own the car. And in the meantime I won't have to worry about doing too many miles or shelling out wads of cash to get every little mark refurbed to factory standards. (Daughter was stiffed £600 for a slightly knocked door mirror on her Audi.)

Horses for courses, I suppose?

Lumbering dinosaur BJ

bungeejumper wrote:

AF62 wrote:Or for a Yaris £1,400 down and £225 a month.

bungeejumper wrote:

I think time has caught up with us all. You can easily spend £20K on a Ford Fiesta these days, and that's just a 1 litre petrol Ecoboost.

.

I never did quite get the hang of PCP, but why would the differential between those two quotes be so large if the difference in the windscreen sticker price was so slim? (In this case, £2 to £3K at most.)



Lumbering dinosaur BJ

================================

PCP is heavily pushed and gift wrapped .

i see that as being good for someone else , and not good for me.

and the return conditions are onerous and at their discretion - so were over a barrel.

no brainer - avoid .

jackdaww wrote:

bungeejumper wrote:

AF62 wrote:Or for a Yaris £1,400 down and £225 a month.



.

I never did quite get the hang of PCP, but why would the differential between those two quotes be so large if the difference in the windscreen sticker price was so slim? (In this case, £2 to £3K at most.)



Lumbering dinosaur BJ

================================

PCP is heavily pushed and gift wrapped .

i see that as being good for someone else , and not good for me.

and the return conditions are onerous and at their discretion - so were over a barrel.

no brainer - avoid .

I'm always suspicious of fancy schemes, especially those where there's some judgement involved by the very people who hold the whip hand - i.e. judging the condition of something being returned. For that reason, I've hardly ever hired a car.

Anyhow, my usual method is a 1-2 year old car plus a loan from myself. As soon as I have a car, I'll set up a saving scheme to myself instead of to a finance company. This particular time, I've been paying in monthly to Fundsmith which seems to have been rather better than paying someone else's interest.
Now we have enough accumulated and are thinking about something like a hybrid - Toyota being on the short list. However, I still can't get my head round what the advantage is to me in buying something with expensive batteries which are a nightmare cost when they need replacing, take up a large volume and add weight - over a normal petrol engine.

Does it make any economic sense to a low to average mileage family? I have severe doubts, but am still interested to learn over the next months or year as replacement time comes up.
Very happy driving a diesel Merc and can't see much point in incurring loads more depreciation. And my wife has a low mileage Citroen C3 which just keeps reliably plodding on with zero depreciation and low repair bills - not worth selling and going to being a one car family as the cost is so low.

Arb.

I found a youtube "How to sell PCP" guide a few months ago (can't find it now unfortunately). It was aimed at salespeople in US car dealerships but the key points also apply in the UK.

It was quite insightful. Basically, the key parameter driving profitability for the dealership is negotiating the length of the deal. Buyers fixate on the monthly payment above all else. As wholesale finance costs are low and the depreciation curve between (say) 3 years and 4 years is relatively flat, that extra year of payments is largely profit.

More generally, in my opinion, buyers of new cars (as opposed to used) pay a huge premium for the newness. That is reflected in the initial depreciation. For car makers, the key is to persuade buyers to surf that curve and keep buying new cars to sell them after a few years. PCP is a clever way to do that. But irrespective of how you get into a new car, you will end up paying that depreciation.

Arborbridge wrote:

ReallyVeryFoolish wrote:Mrs Soap has had a Yaris Hybrid four years now. It's a terrific little car. She'll keep it till the wheels fall off. Which could be a very long time indeed.

There's a couple of factors at play here - 1 The depreciating GBP which is forever pushing up the price of imported cars and the like. 2 Very few people pay the sticker price for a car now. Most people go into a dealership and the conversation goes "what can I have for £350 a month please"? The list prices of the cars reflects this. Naturally, large fleet buyers get huge discounts anyway so the forecourt price doesn't bother them.

RVF

She'll keep it till the wheels fall off. Hopefully until just before the wheels fall off!

Or possibly just before the batteries expire or is it the intention to replace the batteries?

Arborbridge wrote:

jackdaww wrote:

bungeejumper wrote:
Lumbering dinosaur BJ

================================

Now we have enough accumulated and are thinking about something like a hybrid - Toyota being on the short list. However, I still can't get my head round what the advantage is to me in buying something with expensive batteries which are a nightmare cost when they need replacing, take up a large volume and add weight - over a normal petrol engine.

Does it make any economic sense to a low to average mileage family? I have severe doubts, but am still interested to learn over the next months or year as replacement time comes up.


Arb.

===========================

my current thinking on hybrids.--

what is the benefit to me and others ?

there is no magic advantage on fuel economy or green-ness - the battery is charged from somewhere - the engine or the mains.

in fact the extra weight involved reduces the economy - partly offset by braking regeneration etc , but i doubt if it amounts to much .

one big advantage is if driving in a busy densely populated area , there will be much less pollution in that area , if running on the battery .

Arborbridge wrote:Now we have enough accumulated and are thinking about something like a hybrid - Toyota being on the short list. However, I still can't get my head round what the advantage is to me in buying something with expensive batteries which are a nightmare cost when they need replacing, take up a large volume and add weight - over a normal petrol engine.

Does it make any economic sense to a low to average mileage family? I have severe doubts, but am still interested to learn over the next months or year as replacement time comes up.
Very happy driving a diesel Merc and can't see much point in incurring loads more depreciation. And my wife has a low mileage Citroen C3 which just keeps reliably plodding on with zero depreciation and low repair bills - not worth selling and going to being a one car family as the cost is so low.

Arb.

I wouldn't change for the sake of it, unless your mileage is so low that you're not getting the DPF in your Merc up to temperature .

On hybrids, the evidence so far is that car batteries seem to be lasting better than expected. Also, they just degrade gradually over time so still have say 80% of their initial capacity after 10yrs / 100k miles. They don't tend to 'fail'. Just look on Autotrader and you'll see Prius minicabs with 300k miles still on the original batteries. Furthermore, batteries are getting cheaper and cheaper. So in short, by the time you may wish to replace them, the small battery in a hybrid (typically 10% of the size of that in a fully electric car) may only cost a few hundred pounds to replace. I don't think it's an issue.

My rough rule of thumb based on costs and benefits would be:
Mileage < 10k pa, mostly town and country... get a petrol car.
Mileage < 10k pa, regular city driving... get a hybrid car.
Mileage > 10k pa, regular city driving, few >150mi journeys... get an electric car.
Mileage > 10k pa, regular city driving and some >150mi journeys... get a hybrid car.
Otherwise, get a diesel car.

Bear in mind that on motorway and a-road driving, a hybrid is just a regular car hauling an extra 100-200kg of dead weight.

This is for a private motorist paying for your own costs, I think the incentives for business or company cars can skew things a little.

Arborbridge wrote:Now we have enough accumulated and are thinking about something like a hybrid - Toyota being on the short list. However, I still can't get my head round what the advantage is to me in buying something with expensive batteries which are a nightmare cost when they need replacing, take up a large volume and add weight - over a normal petrol engine.

Does it make any economic sense to a low to average mileage family? I have severe doubts, but am still interested to learn over the next months or year as replacement time comes up.
Very happy driving a diesel Merc and can't see much point in incurring loads more depreciation. And my wife has a low mileage Citroen C3 which just keeps reliably plodding on with zero depreciation and low repair bills - not worth selling and going to being a one car family as the cost is so low.

Arb.

I think a hybrid might make sense if you do a high mileage which includes a lot of driving in town and traffic congestion. Using electric power can reduce local pollution.
If your mileage is low, a plug-in hybrid may make more sense, though you'd be lugging a heavy, complex inactive ICE around for no obvious reason.
For low to average mileage, I would think the optimum choice is either fully-electric, or petrol. Low mileage and diesel is not a good or efficient combination, especially in town.

--kiloran