Car for around 4-5k

[TW]Fox;19970613 said:
You already own something that fits that. Use it and get some perspective. From your thread last year it was a second hand Octavia purchased a year ago, it can't be worth much more than £10k anyway, so buying a £5k car to keep it nice just seems daft?

Enjoy it!

I fully expect a toys/pram moment in a minute but if you think about it logically, everyone in this thread is right.

If you are that worried, sell it. It's a Skoda Octavia - it's a definitive A to B mid-sized car. If you are going to buy a £5k car to use for work why not just sell the Skoda and use the £5k car anyway? I mean will you actually drive it? Will you really bother to swap them around in the drive etc etc to pop to the shops? It's a completely normal car, it makes no sense at all to have a runabout to go with it.

Why buy into the world of £5k cars with repair bills, etc etc for such a trivial and bizarre reason?
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Toys and pram? Left that behind 30 years ago.

Guys, I realise that the Octavia is nothing special compared to what some of you drive, but it's a nice car for ME. I've spent a lot on it and spend decent money to keep it pristine.

I want something where I won't care about jumping in with dusty clothes, giving one of my contractors a lift or throwing tools in the boot. The oil and grime adds up quick and I want to keep the Octavia clean.

I knew it was going to kick up the usual storm as a simple question usually does in Motors, but please, pretend as if it's not your money and tell me what you would buy for the price range I've given. There was also a reason I said in the first post that the 'reason is not relevant' as I knew full well what would happen.

So, I'm an idiot, delusional, <Insert something else here> etc etc. I know, now can we please move on to the actual question and not the reason why.
 
Save yourself £2k

http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classif.../radius/1501/postcode/sr28ju/page/8?logcode=p

Something along those lines, You have 2.0, TDCI's anything you could want engine wise really (no idea on how many miles you do)

It's smart, big enough and you won't go crazy when it's filthy. Treat yourself to a holiday and use the other £1k for running it or something.

Nothing in the price range of £4-5k is going to get you anything more than newer, Which isn't a requirement.
 
Buy an Octavia vRS. You can get them for £6k.

Then sell yours.

I've spent a lot on it and spend decent money to keep it pristine.
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So get some use out of it. Because if you buy a £5k car for work, you'll rarely ever use the Octavia again. You'll end up finding it just easier to take the work car and before you know it the Octavia has been relegated to just those special occasions and, lets face it, it's not a Caterham is it, it isnt the sort of car you take out just for fun.

It might well be that the Octavia isn't suitable (Though I cannot see why). Therefore move it on and replace it with something more suitable, or just use it.

The cost of running two cars like this is just pointless waste. If one was a Roadster or something then fair enough...

You own a Skoda Octavia. It is not a Porsche 911. It is not a Caterham 7 and it is not a Lotus Elise. Infact the entire target market of the Octavia is people who need a practical car. IE, people with your work criteria!

Its what its made for. It's its destiny.

If you do buy another car, then sell the Octavia and buy something nice for occasional use, or dont bother with two cars. It makes no sense at all to have an Octavia as a 'car for best'.

With the sort of money you'll spend doing this you could save it in the bank and when the contract is finished spend a fortune fully refurbishing the Octavia if you are that bothered - and you'd have ended up driving something nice day in day out .
 
regulus said:
Fox, if you had 5k to spend on a car, what would you buy?
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An E39 530i Sport - but it's none of your requirements and probably more hassle than its worth so thats probably not the right question to ask me. I'm an irrational fanboy of that particular car.

If you are asking what I'd buy if I was going bonkers and wanted to leave a perfectly good car on the drive then I'd probably be looking at something like.. hmm, £5k is a pretty horrible budget actually, too much for a snotter but not enough for some of the newer gen stuff. I think I'd probably end up with a tidy Mondeo Ghia X.
 
[TW]Fox;19970864 said:
An E39 530i Sport - but it's none of your requirements and probably more hassle than its worth so thats probably not the right question to ask me. I'm an irrational fanboy of that particular car.

If you are asking what I'd buy if I was going bonkers and wanted to leave a perfectly good car on the drive then I'd probably be looking at something like.. hmm, £5k is a pretty horrible budget actually, too much for a snotter but not enough for some of the newer gen stuff. I think I'd probably end up with a tidy Mondeo Ghia X.
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I'll think about what you said about selling the Octavia, getting a proper Sunday car along with a workhorse for ..work, but I won't do it any time soon. I'm usually in company rentals and I know what they look like after a major contract and don't wish that on a car I spent near enough 11k on.
 
I really do think some perspective is required. Nobody is belittling your car or saying it sucks or anything like that - but that doesn't mean we can't offer perspective.

It's an £11k Octavia. A very nice car but is it really of such a high value that you need to spend nearly half its value on something else to protect it? You are increasing your car values to £16,000 to avoid damage to an £11k car.

You won't treat your car like you would a rental - and you can't have done THAT much damage to a rental or you'd have been billed a fortune in repair charges. I really think you need to sit down and have a long hard think about what makes the most sense here.

I'm presuming the Octavia is under 3 years old. It therefore has a warranty and a manufacturer assistance program. If it breaks on the way to the site, presumably Skoda come and scoop it up and give you a loan car. If your £5k car breaks on the way to the site, you don't get paid that day and you've got to pay to fix the car.

Add up all the potential costs of the £5k car, add them to the costs of running and owning the Octavia, and you'll realise just quite how expensive this plan is going to work out as being.

Use the Octavia for what its for - and just be a bit careful. Even in the worst case scenario, you reverse it into the side of a skip or puncture 2 tyres, you'd probably still spend less putting it right than you'd have spent extra to run something else.
 
[TW]Fox;19970941 said:
You won't treat your car like you would a rental - and you can't have done THAT much damage to a rental or you'd have been billed a fortune in repair charges. I really think you need to sit down and have a long hard think about what makes the most sense here.
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I think you'd be surprised how easy it can be for a car to get completely battered being used for a construction related job.

The dust gets everywhere, the seats get covered in crap, the boot gets full of crap, other people on site don't care and you get scratches etc. etc. etc.

I can see why he'd want to avoid taking a car he's sunk £11k of his own cash into, i'm reluctant enough doing it with a car I spent £2k on :p
 
I work in construction and have the option of running my own car. I was more than happy to take my old Fabia to site but cars quickly get into a right state. I've recently bought a much newer car and wouldn't want it near most sites.

Having said that, doubling up tax, insurance servicing etc every year would not appeal to me. We have a choice between using our own vehicles or using a pool / hire car. I'll be taking the latter option for the foreseeable future.
 
£5k pays for an awful lot of paint correction, valets, scuff repairs etc etc etc

stop being so bloody daft!
 
£4k seems pointless money to me - its too much of a middle ground. Surely this calls either for a £500 snotter or for biting the bullet and risking the pride and joy?
Honda Accord, an old Volvo etc?
 
act smiley said:
£4k seems pointless money to me - its too much of a middle ground. Surely this calls either for a £500 snotter or for biting the bullet and risking the pride and joy?
Honda Accord, an old Volvo etc?
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Honda Accord fits the reliable requirment, but when they do go wrong they can be expensive.

If you already have an Octavia and don't want another one then get a £2k Mondeo.
 
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