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Model specific boards => Golf mk7 => Topic started by: golfgtiboss on 27 October 2014, 15:07

Title: Want a GTI but difficult to justify cost
Post by: golfgtiboss on 27 October 2014, 15:07
Hey guys i would like to buy a new GTI however the finance figures suggest i will pay in the region of £350 per month, which =£12600 over 3 years on a PCP agreement. This ultimately means that i would essentially be paying an extremely large amount of money to 'rent' this car.

My fuel bill would also increase by £500 per year by buying this car. Can i ask what people's thought processes are as there may be an alternative ways of thinking about this that i am not considering...

My current car is a 58 plate BMW 120D which i purchased used (for cheap) which is costing me very little and just finding extreme dificulty in pulling the trigger on the GTI that i would LOVE but just can't get my head around the cost!!!

Thank you
Title: Re: Want a GTI but difficult to justify cost
Post by: matchboy on 27 October 2014, 15:13
Hey guys i would like to buy a new GTI however the finance figures suggest i will pay in the region of £350 per month, which =£12600 over 3 years on a PCP agreement. This ultimately means that i would essentially be paying an extremely large amount of money to 'rent' this car.

My fuel bill would also increase by £500 per year by buying this car. Can i ask what people's thought processes are as there may be an alternative ways of thinking about this that i am not considering...

My current car is a 58 plate BMW 120D which i purchased used (for cheap) which is costing me very little and just finding extreme dificulty in pulling the trigger on the GTI that i would LOVE but just can't get my head around the cost!!!

Thank you

What kind of deposit are you putting down?  Are you working this out on the list price or is this after discount (12%)?
Title: Re: Want a GTI but difficult to justify cost
Post by: fredgroves on 27 October 2014, 15:14
Yes a brand new turbo charged petrol hot hatch costs more than a old oil burner to buy, own and run.

Obviously its more fun, but how often will you have that fun? How much per hour of fun will it cost and can you afford it?

Whilst a GTI is a perfectly practical form of transport (unlike say a Lotus Elise), its not the cheapest by a long old way.

Only you can answer if its worth it...

Title: Re: Want a GTI but difficult to justify cost
Post by: isleaiw on 27 October 2014, 15:25
Hey guys i would like to buy a new GTI however the finance figures suggest i will pay in the region of £350 per month, which =£12600 over 3 years on a PCP agreement. This ultimately means that i would essentially be paying an extremely large amount of money to 'rent' this car.

My fuel bill would also increase by £500 per year by buying this car. Can i ask what people's thought processes are as there may be an alternative ways of thinking about this that i am not considering...

My current car is a 58 plate BMW 120D which i purchased used (for cheap) which is costing me very little and just finding extreme dificulty in pulling the trigger on the GTI that i would LOVE but just can't get my head around the cost!!!

Thank you

I dont think you can justify it on cost grounds. I was running a 160k mile Volvo up until 2 years ago - worth 1800 quid, hardly ever went wrong, did 45mpg, could leave it anywhere.... Decided I needed to change it before it became unreliable (no transport means no pay when you are on a day rate!) so swapped it for a 6 month old E class.... Clearly, the E is much better car and a class up in all ways, but I do resent the cost as it is generally just a family and work hack.

My wife's GTI on the other hand is my weekend toy and whilst it does very little mileage, I don't resent what that costs as it isnt a head purchase and it doesnt need to be rationalised!

Ian
Title: Re: Want a GTI but difficult to justify cost
Post by: corgi on 27 October 2014, 17:03
Agree with the above.

If you analysed it on cost grounds you wouldn't buy a GTI. You would buy the cheapest (total cost of ownership) car that would meet your requirements.

I couldn't cost justify my 911 when I bought it used... but I'm glad I bought it.

If you tried to cost justify every purchase you made then you'd rarely buy anything... do you have a Playstattion/X-Box, a flat screen led TV etc. how did you cost justify those?

The decision should be... I want a, in this case, Golf GTI, what am I prepared to pay for the pleasure? If you're not willing to pay £350/month and an extra £40 per month in fuel then, fine, you'd best go and find something that more closely fits your requirement in terms of the balance of costs...
Title: Re: Want a GTI but difficult to justify cost
Post by: dubber36 on 27 October 2014, 17:07
The car you drive is a lifestyle choice. If you analise the costs, having a nice car makes absolutely no financial sense at all. The sensible approach would be to buy a 12 year old Golf TDI 130 for £1500, budget £1000 a year to service and maintain it and use the money you save to pay your mortgage off. However, not everyone wants to drive round in an older car (not that there's anything wrong with that) we like to have nice things as a reward to ourselves for working hard.

If you don't feel comfortable with the idea of borrowing a whole heap of money to drive around in a nice, new car, then don't. However if you really want the GTI and can afford it, it's going to cost what it costs. Only you can decide what you want to do.
Title: Re: Want a GTI but difficult to justify cost
Post by: monkeyhanger on 27 October 2014, 17:08
Well there's no free lunch, running a new car is an expensive business, although the VW residuals do ease the pain.

You'd probably get an R for less money than that GTI right now (you can lease for 2 years at about £6700 all in - a true £279 ave per month cost), with the difference more than making up for the extra fuelling costs between the 2 - something to consider. Once you get in the habit of regularly getting a new car, we can all consider ourselves renters really - no-one keeps a car for 10 years these days.

From a fuelling point of view i'm probably in a similar boat to you, coming from a GTD. I'm getting made redundant next year and there seems plenty of work in my field going right now, so i'm going to buy an R outright with a small part of my lumper. With £5k equity in my GTD at pick-up time and £3600 off RRP, i'm needing to put £22k in. If GFVs haven't been overstated, that car will be worth £19600 in p/x after 3 years, £2400 depreciation for me to suffer. With that in mind, fuelling costs are worth it to me for the extra fun factor in having that R. Those are my reasons to change.
Title: Re: Want a GTI but difficult to justify cost
Post by: monkeyhanger on 27 October 2014, 17:11
The trouble with the great residuals on the VW is that they make less sense buying nearly new than new, especially if you need finance and the used lot's APR will be higher than that for a new one, eroding a lot of the sticker price savings.
Title: Re: Want a GTI but difficult to justify cost
Post by: dubber36 on 27 October 2014, 17:13
no-one keeps a car for 10 years these days.

I kept my last Passat V6TDI for nearly 9 years. (But I do seem to be in the minority when it comes to my opinions on funding vehicles) It got to a point when depreciation was no longer and issue. Yes it needed more maintaining, but the cost of that was way less that the cost of changing cars 2 or 3 times during that time.
Title: Re: Want a GTI but difficult to justify cost
Post by: dubber36 on 27 October 2014, 17:17
The trouble with the great residuals on the VW is that they make less sense buying nearly new than new,

It depends which car you buy. My old Passat cost me £16,000 when it was 11 months old (£23,700 new.) My current one was £16,8000 at 14 months old (£27,500 new)
Title: Re: Want a GTI but difficult to justify cost
Post by: monkeyhanger on 27 October 2014, 17:32
The trouble with the great residuals on the VW is that they make less sense buying nearly new than new,

It depends which car you buy. My old Passat cost me £16,000 when it was 11 months old (£23,700 new.) My current one was £16,8000 at 14 months old (£27,500 new)

Residuals are creeping up with the other cars in the VW range, although Golf is definitely king, with Scircco and Tiguan a little behind - they used to be crap on the Polo (compared to the Golf), now its around 47%, a lot better than most superminis. The cars in Passat's class are considered to be rep-mobiles, very few are bought new privately. You can see it in the Audi range too when A6's have cataclysmic residuals relative to the marque and a once £28k A4 can be bought for less than a once £22k A3, both 18 months down the line.

If I was looking for a cheap nearly new car similar in size to the Golf that's taken a residual hammering in the meantime, i'd probably be looking at a 2 year old Alfa Giulietta with 3 of it's 5 years warranty left intact, or maybe a Volvo V40.
Title: Re: Want a GTI but difficult to justify cost
Post by: Yarrac on 27 October 2014, 18:51
The others have nailed it really. If we were all sensible then we would all be drving around in a 3 year old 1.1L 5 door average white car, after all it would get you from A to B. However, cars, like life, allow you to decide to spend extra money to get nicer things, even if they are not vital.

If you think its worth that cost then go for it. Failing that, get a loan and buy a second hand Mk6 GTI
Title: Re: Want a GTI but difficult to justify cost
Post by: Mark V GTD on 28 October 2014, 13:01
I'm not sure where the OP got his finance figures from. VWFS are doing a 750 quid deposit contribution at the moment, so if you go for a 3-door manual GTI in red (and negotiate a 10% discount - or more from a broker), then put down 10% deposit you can be repaying as low as 276 a month. Even with a 1,600 deposit that goes up to 308 a  month.
Title: Re: Want a GTI but difficult to justify cost
Post by: dubber36 on 28 October 2014, 13:13
Perhaps he's being realistic about the mileage he'll do.
Title: Re: Want a GTI but difficult to justify cost
Post by: Mark V GTD on 28 October 2014, 14:09
Yes thats a possibility - although if cost per month is such a significant issue keeping the 'hand back' allowance at 5,000 is very effective...
Title: Re: Want a GTI but difficult to justify cost
Post by: fredgroves on 28 October 2014, 17:35
Didn't someone say the mileage on a lease you need to look at carefully? He said something about the excess mileage charge strangely being cheaper - ie lease for 5k, do 15k = cheaper than leasing at 15k?

Maybe you just need to look carefully at ALL of the lease numbers and shop around.
Title: Re: Want a GTI but difficult to justify cost
Post by: Mark V GTD on 30 October 2014, 22:42
With a VW PCP if you go over the mileage limit at the end of the agreement and decide to hand the car back (although I'm not sure many do) the amount you pay per mile is less than the additional cost of taking out the agreement with a higher mileage allowance!