Well, I wasn’t expecting that to have happened !

[Sootchucker]

Long post I’m afraid

Hi all, and a good morning to you all. Had a bit of a strange weekend. Was invited by my local dealer to attend a special (by invitation only) VIP event this weekend, which was supposed to be a one off weekend where the dealership is closed to the general public, and just those invited can come and look at some new cars with (and I quote), “never to be repeated deals”.

Well the wife and I accepted the invite and tootled along on Sunday, to be honest not really expecting much – a bit of sales patter and maybe a few hundred quid of various cars etc. In any case, I went armed with my Ipad which had all the quotes on it from Drive the deal, orange wheels and Car Wow, for which I’d got prices a month or so ago on two new cars – a GTI to replace my GTD and a new Polo Blue GT to replace, well the current Blue GT.

The cheapest quotes on both cars were funnily enough from Car Wow. So I sat with the same sales man that I bought our last 6 VW’s from, and went straight for the jugular and said, these are the specs and these are the prices you need to beat to get us to swap our existing cars and order new. Anyway to cut a very long story short, they not only did it, but obliterated Car Wow’s quote, by over £1,450 on the Golf and £1,150 on the Polo. Basically for the spec we ordered, they gave us the loyalty bonus, and extra on the Day £500, as well as VW finance contributions amounting to 16.1% off the GTI list, and 16.2% off the Polo.

Now I thought here’s the challenge, my car is currently in negative equity (based upon Part ex quotes received from Car Wow directly), to the tune of nearly £1100.00 on the GTD, and about £400 on the wife’s current Blue GT. Well they want away and offered my £500 over my current settlement figure on the Golf (which they got off the system) and nearly £800 more on the wife’s Polo than she owes, and they have fixed the part ex prices until both cars arrives. Obviously as more payments are made, the debt decreases and the collateral increases on both cars.

Finally to top it all, we got 2 years servicing thrown in, Cherished plate transfers on both cars done, free mats for the Polo (they come as standard on the Golf). Total payments are only £40 more per month than I currently pay and £20 for the wife (so not massive) with £5k down on the Golf and £3.5k down on the Polo (less deposit than we paid on the current cars !)

So to cut a very long boring story short, despite the wife and I agreeing recently that we would keep both cars and pay off the PCP (which we have the money for the final balloon payments already for), we have ordered two new cars.

I’ve ordered a GTI, 5 door, DSG, Carbon Steel Grey, 19” Santiago’s (although I’m considering going back to the standard 18” alloys), Tech Pack, Parking Pack, High Beam assist, dynamic chassis control.

The wife has ordered a Polo Blue GT, 3 door, DSG, Blue Silk metallic, Xenon Headlights, climate control, winter pack, convenience pack, parking sensors front/rear, air bag deactivation switch, Discover Navigation, App connect, Adaptive cruise control (as we love this on the Golf).

Happy days. Just need to NOT keep checking the tracker twice daily as I did before as that just drove me nuts!

[Mk7-GTD]

Sounds like two cracking deals.

BTW for your other "questions" yes the Discover Pro comes with App connect and if you get the wheels and don't like them I have a GTd coming with standard 18's and I might do a deal with you with a wad of cash your way obviously.

[JBirchy]

Fantastic deals, congrats! I for one am looking forward to your comparison between GTI and GTD after you've had chance to run it in.

Great specs on both motors too!

[Sootchucker]

Thanks guys. Nothing wrong with the current cars at all, but will be 3 years old in 3 months for the wife and 6 months for me, so I know that there would be no more warranty (so an expense), no more servicing FOC, would need MOT's etc. Also as I said whilst we have the money, we would have had to pay £24,000 to pay off the PCP's on both cars (which we were willing to do), but I'd rather just pay £8.5k now and have the other £15,500 sat in our savings account 

Couple that with the fact that my mileage has dropped to around 8,500 a year, and a diesel makes a little less sense, and I think the added fuel consumption of the GTI wouldn't hit the wallet too hard ?

I drive my GTD quite sedately (getting old and roads too congested), so I'm averaging around 43mpg now (with the cold weather) and around 47 mpg (ish) overall in the summer. I also did a 500 mile round trip to Scotland over the weekend and averaged 55mpg dead (done on refilling the car). So I'm hoping that an average MPG for the GTi will be around 33-35 (?) so around 70-80 miles less or around £9.30 a fill up - not the end of the world.

I'm also hoping that cruising at 65-70, a GTI will see high thirties / low forties on a good motorway run, so only around 10-15mpg lower than the GTD (or am I dreaming) ?

[Talk-torque]

Some good deals out there. VW must be hurting. Cars are still great though! Nice result at the right time for you.

[Jackie Treehorn]

Thanks guys. Nothing wrong with the current cars at all, but will be 3 years old in 3 months for the wife and 6 months for me, so I know that there would be no more warranty (so an expense), no more servicing FOC, would need MOT's etc. Also as I said whilst we have the money, we would have had to pay £24,000 to pay off the PCP's on both cars (which we were willing to do), but I'd rather just pay £8.5k now and have the other £15,500 sat in our savings account 

Couple that with the fact that my mileage has dropped to around 8,500 a year, and a diesel makes a little less sense, and I think the added fuel consumption of the GTI wouldn't hit the wallet too hard ?

I drive my GTD quite sedately (getting old and roads too congested), so I'm averaging around 43mpg now (with the cold weather) and around 47 mpg (ish) overall in the summer. I also did a 500 mile round trip to Scotland over the weekend and averaged 55mpg dead (done on refilling the car). So I'm hoping that an average MPG for the GTi will be around 33-35 (?) so around 70-80 miles less or around £9.30 a fill up - not the end of the world.

I'm also hoping that cruising at 65-70, a GTI will see high thirties / low forties on a good motorway run, so only around 10-15mpg lower than the GTD (or am I dreaming) ?

Will be good to hear your qualified positives and negatives of the GTi when it arrives.  I drive sedately most of the time and my long term (10k) avg is 38mpg, so it shouldn't hit too hard.

Is it a Performance Pack GTi or?

[Sootchucker]

No, standard non PP Jackie, the PP was just a stretch too far, and to be honest for my style of driving, I doubt the electronic diff and bigger brakes and 10ps would make much of a difference to me (although the front brakes do look well cool).

[JBirchy]

MPG-wise, I live in a rural area with some quite marvellous B-Roads, and I must admit I do drive rather enthusiastically on a regular basis. That said I also do some sedate miles with the family in the car so it's a varied spectrum of driving. My average over the last 2500 miles is 34.7 according to the car.

On a long run at 65-70mph, 42mpg is easily achievable. I'd be fairly confident at saying that for 8,500 miles per year, you won't even notice the increase in fuel usage. Plus, it will be worth it to hear the nice throaty burble and upshift farts of the motor/gearbox!

[Sootchucker]

That's what I'm hoping Birchy   

[Watts]

I too am a relaxed driver (OH might say old and grumpy) and have seen 45mpg on a long slow motorway run, 40-42 when in a hurry! Long term average also currently around 38 which I think is excellent.