Just passed my test! What next?

vincent1989

vincent1989

vincent1989

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first post in motors but as the title says I've just passed my practical test (2 minors) and having no close family to turn to in regards to motoring questions (no drivers in my immediate family!!) I thought I'd turn to my surrogate parent that is OcUK.

so what I really wanted to know is how much should I be looking to spend on a first car and what sort of make/model (did most of my lessons in a fiat 500 and the test in the new corsa)? And also what should I be looking at in terms of insurance cost? what's the best policy to get, fully comp/3rd party/ fire and theft, who's going to offer the best price for a 22 year old male?

currently got about £600 saved and can put around £500 away every month but the reality of it is the cheaper the better.


any help is much appreciated :).
 
vincent1989 said:
currently got about £600 saved and can put around £500 away every month but the reality of it is the cheaper the better.
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Well that should cover almost half your insurance ^^

Seriously though get something cheap and hard to break, it will be fubar by the time you part with it anyway.
 
In terms of first car you generally have 2 options. Your usual small city hatchback, something like a Corsa / Fiesta / Yaris etc. These are generally cheap to run but a bit more to buy. You may find that for the same money you can get a considerably better specced Mondeo sized car that probably wont be any more to insure. As despite being more powerful, they are generally not driven by young drivers and thus, are crashed less.

With either choice as a new driver you are going to be looking at around 4 figures for insurance. I personally would not spend too much on the car as your fairly likely to prang it at some point.

I personally would go for something like a 1.25 Fiesta or 1.6 Focus if I had just passed my test, and I would be looking to do it all for about £4000 using whatever change I get from insurance quotes to buy the car (ie 1000 on insurance 3000 for the car).

In terms of policies I have always found fully comp to be the cheapest as long as you specify a large voluntary excess. Fully compy with a £350 voluntary excess and a parent or two added on as second drivers should help to keep your costs as low as possible.

**EDIT**

Just noticed your reply. You shouldnt be getting insurance quotes of £2500 at your age, if you are you are quite simply doing it wrong. Get yourself a basic car reg plate, something like a 1.6 Focus. Hop on confused, specify fully comp with a large voluntary excess and add an older family member, anyone who has had a licence a long time and has losts of no claims will do, as a second driver. Hopefully that should get your prices down to a more reasonable level. Take the top 10 or so from the comparison site and then ring them directly as they can often do better deals.

If the prices on comparison sites are still rubbish skip it and ring directly from the get go.
 
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BinnsY said:
In terms of first car you generally have 2 options. Your usual small city hatchback, something like a Corsa / Fiesta / Yaris etc. These are generally cheap to run but a bit more to buy. You may find that for the same money you can get a considerably better specced Mondeo sized car that probably wont be any more to insure. As despite being more powerful, they are generally not driven by young drivers and thus, are crashed less.

With either choice as a new driver you are going to be looking at around 4 figures for insurance. I personally would not spend too much on the car as your fairly likely to prang it at some point.

I personally would go for something like a 1.25 Fiesta or 1.6 Focus if I had just passed my test, and I would be looking to do it all for about £4000 using whatever change I get from insurance quotes to buy the car (ie 1000 on insurance 3000 for the car).

In terms of policies I have always found fully comp to be the cheapest as long as you specify a large voluntary excess. Fully compy with a £350 voluntary excess and a parent or two added on as second drivers should help to keep your costs as low as possible.

**EDIT**

Just noticed your reply. You shouldnt be getting insurance quotes of £2500 at your age, if you are you are quite simply doing it wrong. Get yourself a basic car reg plate, something like a 1.6 Focus. Hop on confused, specify fully comp with a large voluntary excess and add an older family member, anyone who has had a licence a long time and has losts of no claims will do, as a second driver. Hopefully that should get your prices down to a more reasonable level. Take the top 10 or so from the comparison site and then ring them directly as they can often do better deals.

If the prices on comparison sites are still rubbish skip it and ring directly from the get go.
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thanks for the information, very helpful. I would be more inclined to go for a smaller hatchback as that's what I've learned in and it's just the easier option in my opinion.
Can I name a driver who's actually never going to use it though? both my grandads drive but my dad/mum other close relatives don't drive, no license etc so how does that work?
 
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Firstly, congrats! :)

BinnsY said:
Just noticed your reply. You shouldnt be getting insurance quotes of £2500 at your age, if you are you are quite simply doing it wrong. Get yourself a basic car reg plate, something like a 1.6 Focus. Hop on confused, specify fully comp with a large voluntary excess and add an older family member, anyone who has had a licence a long time and has losts of no claims will do, as a second driver. Hopefully that should get your prices down to a more reasonable level. Take the top 10 or so from the comparison site and then ring them directly as they can often do better deals.

If the prices on comparison sites are still rubbish skip it and ring directly from the get go.
Click to expand...

This is pretty much exactly what I did, passed last year just before turning 23. Was getting cheaper insurance quotes on a 1.8 5dr Focus than I was on the smaller hatchbacks (Possibly because the Focus is seen as a "family car"?)

Best quotes for new/newish drivers appear to be from the Admiral Group - putting a couple of low risk named drivers on your policy really does take a large chunk off too :) I do believe it's fine even if they don't plan on driving a car, they just have to have a valid licence and be legally able to drive.
 
Going to cost you more to buy and insure a small hatchback, may as well just get a bigger car and learn to drive it.

I also wouldn't spend too much on a first car as you are very likely to prange it at some point, £500 Mk1 Mondeo with gaffer tape on the rear bumpers, cheap to buy and will last a long time.

Thing to bear in mind is that the stuff you learn to pass your test isn't actually all that much and you'll find that a lot of things that go on day to day aren't the same. Your real learning starts now.

Assuming you can even get insured... insurance companies hate young drivers these days :(
 
I passed last September.

I drive a focus 1.6 as well (2001 Y reg). Paid £950 for it with 10 months tax.

Cheapest car I could find to insure tbh, hundreds lower than fiestas/corsas etc. Much nicer to drive too (I had two weeks of the mrs's fiesta 1.3 and wow....what a bag o' **** in comparison).

The focus isn't that big a car and I find it easier to park than the fiesta.
 
Postcode seems to be the big factor after age. At home, with one parent as a named driver I'm looking at just under 4 grand as a 20 year old. In coventry (uni home) I'm looking at 2 grand with no parents as named drivers. Mental.
 
vincent1989 said:
thanks for the information, very helpful. I would be more inclined to go for a smaller hatchback as that's what I've learned in and it's just the easier option in my opinion.
Can I name a driver who's actually never going to use it though? both my grandads drive but my dad/mum other close relatives don't drive, no license etc so how does that work?
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Yes you can name them even if they never plan to use it. My Mum is on mine and always has been despite only having driven any of my cars about 2 times in 5 years. Quite simply she is on just in case I ever need her to drive it. As none of your family drive putting one of your grandparents on would seem reasonable.

As long as you tell no fibs to the insurance if they specifically ask you how often they will be driving it, and you are down as the main driver it's all above board. Having my mum on is still saving me about £200 a year on insurance. You will probably find it is even more for you.
 
just tried confused with a 2000 (W reg) Ford focus 1.6l with or without named drivers it's still coming up as cheapest with tesco at around £2.5k fully comp with £350 excess, mental, admiral want £3k!
 
:O

Admiral wanted £1230 for a 1.6 focus TPFT for 10 months (accelerator policy). Which they got.

I now have an 11 month old licence and a full years NCB and renewed my insurance for £725 - well worth looking into.
 
vincent1989 said:
just tried confused with a 2000 (W reg) Ford focus 1.6l with or without named drivers it's still coming up as cheapest with tesco at around £2.5k fully comp with £350 excess, mental, admiral want £3k!
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Are you ticking the "I dont own the car yet" box? I've noticed this makes quotes much higher. Try editing it as though you have just purchased the car (set the purchase date to yesterday or something) This seems to get more realistic prices for me.

Also what are you putting as you occupation and what is your postcode?
 
BinnsY said:
Are you ticking the "I dont own the car yet" box? I've noticed this makes quotes much higher. Try editing it as though you have just purchased the car (set the purchase date to yesterday or something) This seems to get more realistic prices for me.

Also what are you putting as you occupation and what is your postcode?
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postcode is for brighton, my occupation is a supervisor in retail, i just put supervisor. i'll try what you've suggested though :).


edit;
nope, same as. I'm figuring I'm just going to need to take it up the bum like a champ for the first year and hope it drops significantly after that. I accept that it must cost a bit to cover all the damages new drivers are likely to cause and I accept that the cost of damages caused is high anyway but it seems that as motor insurance is legally required in this country the insurance companies have us by the short and curlies and don't they bloody well know it too.
 
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vincent1989 said:
just tried confused with a 2000 (W reg) Ford focus 1.6l with or without named drivers it's still coming up as cheapest with tesco at around £2.5k fully comp with £350 excess, mental, admiral want £3k!
Click to expand...

Are you sure you want fully comp? Would the cost of claiming would out weight the cost of buying a new car?
 
shoes said:
:O

Admiral wanted £1230 for a 1.6 focus TPFT for 10 months (accelerator policy). Which they got.

I now have an 11 month old licence and a full years NCB and renewed my insurance for £725 - well worth looking into.
Click to expand...

Aye my 1.8TDCI was 1400 for the 10month premium but I was in a poor postcode. My renewal this year was 620 at a better potcode. Fully comp with the added courtesy car option.
My Excess was 450 last year and dropped it to 150 (luckily as I wrote the car off 2 weeks later :( lol)
 
vincent1989 said:
just tried confused with a 2000 (W reg) Ford focus 1.6l with or without named drivers it's still coming up as cheapest with tesco at around £2.5k fully comp with £350 excess, mental, admiral want £3k!
Click to expand...

£350 excess sounds quite low tbh, £500 is probably a bit more normal and should open up a few more quotes. I've heard people putting it up to £1-1.5k or so to get cheaper quotes and then if you do something silly like put your car upside down through a hedge you can probably get another car instead of claiming (and paying more the next few years due to a claim)

But er, wouldn't want to make a habit of crashing :D
 
Do you need a car though?

If you don't need it, may I suggest saving the money, get a taxi when you need to and get it when you need it. The older you are, especially over 25, the cheaper it will be. It really is no point getting a car if you are sacrificing too much of your other part of your life for something that sits on the drive a lot.
 
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