On Tue, 10 Sep 2019 12:13:00 +0100, Roland Perry
wrote:

In message , at 10:20:29 on Tue, 10 Sep
2019, Recliner remarked:

not many families can afford 30 grand for a second car

It's cheaper than the SUV they probably already have as the second car.

I've got a £10k SUV as my first car. Not everyone buys new.

Plenty can afford it, and do, particularly on PCP.

I'm not sure there aren't some rather onerous requirements for PCP. Like
endowment mortgages back in the day, rather too much pressure which
indicates it's better for the seller than the buyer than the seller.

Oh, I'm quite sure they're better for the sellers than the buyers.
There are many stories of people who've agreed a deal to buy a car,
with a discount or extras thrown in, but when the salesman discovered
that they didn't want credit, the deal was withdrawn, and a much worse
price offered.


Or they buy nearly new.

For a long time my preference was to buy 3yr-old ex-company cars.
Usually at the big auctions. I'm now more into 6yr-old cars with 3yr
mileage on them.

Apart from my very first car, I've always had brand new cars, whether as
company vehicles or personal purchases.

I was spoilt for a long time by being given brand new company cars
(never met a company prepared to buy a used car) although that often
restricts the choice to something I might not have bought with my own
money.

I always chose my company cars, including the model, colour, options,
etc.

I even had an Alfa Romeo once, hardly a typical company car (with good
reason). On more than one occasion both rear doors refused to open,
and my rear seat passengers had to climb over the (non-folding) front
seats. And I could often harvest a small crop of little screws on the
carpet under the dashboard.


Being 'forced' to change it after three years when perfectly happy with
it, grated a bit. One company I know churned them at six months!

Agreed.