Funny enough, I'm looking at some similar cars. I got some prices on a 330i Touring, a 330d Touring and a 340i Touring. I specced them up pretty much fully loaded and the 340i came out best on a PCP deal. £35k after discount (£11k knocked off!), £2k deposit and £495 per month. Pretty amazing really for what is a £46k car with a beautiful straight 6. Pretty amazing deal. If I could shift my GTI and come out reasonable on the equity front, I'd go for it tomorrow.
Ha ha, yes mate - I remember we were both intrigued by the 340i on a previous thread - maybe in saloon format then? Certainly was for me anyway. Did you get to drive any of those in touring/saloon yet? I'll get in touch with the better local dealer shortly to see about driving what they have/can get.
You quote for the 340i sounds impressive if it was pretty loaded - was that from TRL or something? I've only looked online so far, no enquiries made (so broadspeed, coast2coast). Did the 330i actually come out worse in the deal, or was it just so close it was better value to go for the 340i? If I find I do want to stick with manual it will rule out the 340i as the touring loses manual as an option as you've probably seen!
I'm wondering about going very light on options this time round, and in which case I might just lease. Nationwide offer the 340i touring at £395 a month with 3 months initial fee, for 2 or 3 years. So for 2 years it's around £480 a month - which is less than my GTD has cost me now over 2 years. If I kept the GTD 4 years it may (or may not) work out better, but it does make me think about PCP.
As for my negative equity, I'm probably still close to 2k negative (hopefully not more), but if I settle my finance now I will save close to 2k interest - so I am actually break even in terms of the next 2 years other than any equity I might build up - obviously a more painful way to approach it though!
Yes that was a quote from TRL on a 4 year PCP. At the time, he said that due to the extra support available on the 340i and the fact that they were doing Sport Auto transmission FOC on them for a short period, coupled with the increased GFV for the 340i the payments would be within £5 of each other.
Interestingly, I've been doing a lot of research lately on my PCP situation and I'm just nowhere near swapping after 26 months. Even after a 13% DTD discount and my (admittedly small) £1500 deposit, I'm still in around £4k negative equity against a trade in value. Interestingly, BMW value my car now at less than the GFV on the contract after 4 years, and I'm only 2 years in!
If I can sell my car privately at a similar value to those of similar age/mileage on Autotrader, I'm still in around £1k of negative equity on it which is a bit depressing! I've figured out that I'll have paid 50% of Total Contract Value at around 40 months so even a Voluntary Termination is out of the question.
I'll be rethinking what to do next time round as opposed to PCP, I just don't like this negative equity lark. I know VW part ex prices have dropped off a cliff but still, I like the idea of leasing over 2 years and knowing exactly where you are, no negative equity involved.
Food for thought!
