Suggestions for small city car for the missus

jpaul said:
OK there is probably a with and without mirrors quandary - the earlier link is w/o mirrors, but if they hang out a lot (no neck at A pillar height) you've got to budget for that when passing cars;
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Again no, he is talking about parking his car on a drive way, you just fold the mirrors in.
jpaul said:
had two mirror exchanges on previous lhd 3 series over 10 years, and same number of hits on bicycle against oncoming cars.
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You must have a crazy busy drive way.
 
danlightbulb said:
What's your idea of cheap because they seem to be around £12k. That's quite high for a tiny city car.
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Before we get trapped in a DJMK4-esque merry go round, it's important to remember that car prices since 2020 went a bit bonkers and have never really truly reset to the old normality - cars now are more expensive than they used to be and this is going to be the case for virtually anything. If you look at things through a lens of "I used to be able to get X for £Y" then you'll end up doing the same thing and this thread will be here for a year while you look for something that doesn't exist anymore.
 
Found a GT line, 2021, 29k miles, rapid charger - for £9k.

Loan for that would be about £175 over 5 years. Insurance say £50 a month, tax £16. So about £240 all in plus annual MOT and servicing.

That doesn't seem too bad.

Just got to think if owning an EV comes with any big risk?

Does everyone agree that for her circumstances a loan and buying the car outright is better option than a lease?
 
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danlightbulb said:
Found a GT line, 2021, 29k miles, rapid charger - for £9k.

Loan for that would be about £175 over 5 years. Insurance say £50 a month, tax £16. So about £240 all in plus annual MOT and servicing.

That doesn't seem too bad.
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It's not and remember the £175 is servicing a loan cost, not a lease, so you are retaining some of that value in the vehicle when you come to sell it, making the actual overall cost to you even lower.
danlightbulb said:
Just got to think if owning an EV comes with any big risk?
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I think some Zoes came with leased batteries and some with purchased, you need to make sure you know which arrangement any car you buy has and the ongoing implications of that.
 
Kenai said:
some Zoes came with leased batteries and some with purchased, you need to make sure you know which arrangement any car you buy has and the ongoing implications of that.
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Yes aware of this and looking out for it. I was more talking about failure/repair risk. Actually is a leased battery less risky?
 
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danlightbulb said:
Yes aware of this and looking out for it. I was more talking about failure/repair risk. Actually is a leased battery less risky?
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I don't know how the leased battery arrangements work but the purchased ones I think have an 8 year / 100k warranty as is typical for most EVs (edit - for the battery that is, if that wasn't clear, not the whole car)

I suspect the leased battery arrangements are probably more hassle than they're worth, especially went you want to sell the car on.
 
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No one wants an older used car with a battery lease which will still be £x00/month. That’s the main issue with them and why they are so cheap and hard to shift.

@danlightbulb what makes you think an EV is any more risky than an ICE car which can more easily throw a crippling bill more often? For example, an ‘eco boom’ Fiesta that has a ticking time bomb in its ‘lifetime’ wet belt system that costs £lol to replace.

As far as I am aware, there is no major issues cropping up with batteries in a Renault Zoe, they’ve also been on the roads for a good decade that this point and start from about £2k on a private sale with a battery lease, more without.

Old leafs have a degradation issue which we can all agree on but an actual outright failure is incredibly rare.

The only car that I am aware of that has an issue with outright failure outside of warranty is the Tesla Model S 85. Even that is preventable as it’s due to water ingress via seals in the battery housing which fail over time and can be replaced before they deteriorate to the point of letting water in.
 
b0rn2sk8 said:
@danlightbulb what makes you think an EV is any more risky than an ICE car which can more easily throw a crippling bill more often? For example, an ‘eco boom’ Fiesta that has a ticking time bomb in its ‘lifetime’ wet belt system that costs £lol to replace.
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I don't think it's worse, just don't really want any risk, period. I can't afford to deal with major failures. That's a main reason I went for lease myself.
 
But leasing is normally the most expensive way of ‘owning’ anything including a car.

You’ll end up in the new car lease trap which is pretty hard to get out of if you don’t have have a wad of cash in your bank account or without taking an expensive loan to buy something else at the end of the term.
 
danlightbulb said:
I don't think it's worse, just don't really want any risk, period. I can't afford to deal with major failures. That's a main reason I went for lease myself.
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The Zoes are reliable and don't have any major horror stories but no car can be guaranteed to be risk free, you can just get unlucky sometimes.

I think for £9k / £175 a month as long as it's owned battery (pretty sure all 52kWh are owned and only the 40kWh and below were sold under a lease model IIRC) is good value. If you sell in 2-3 years it'll still ahve some value as well.
 
For electric, have a scan at a Mazda MX30. They were given bad reviews because of poor range (circa 100 miles in real world driving). The implications being that they suffered from awful depreciation, and can be picked up for decent money now. The range won't be an issue for short journeys and they're actually quite a pleasant thing to be in, unlike a Zoe.

For petrol, Suzuki Swift or Toyota Auris. Nobody even remembers what the Auris is, which again means bad depreciation, and that they're often cheaper than the Yaris.
 
b0rn2sk8 said:
But leasing is normally the most expensive way of ‘owning’ anything including a car.

You’ll end up in the new car lease trap which is pretty hard to get out of if you don’t have have a wad of cash in your bank account or without taking an expensive loan to buy something else at the end of the term.
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Oh I know. In my case I went for an MG5 which was the cheapest estate EV I could get. Its been great actually. The cost was about the same as I was paying in fuel and maintenance on my old car, hence it made sense for me. However any higher cost car and yeah I'd have been worse off. So I couldn't justify anything 'better' like a BMW or even just a VW. And to get the same car on a loan would have been c.£20k loan which is a big loan that I didn't really want.

In my missus's case she doesn't drive at the moment so whatever she does is completely new outlay. The loan however will be a lot smaller if we can find something decent at around 3-4 years old. I don't think she should spend any more than about £9-10k. No (minimal) fuel costs if she gets an EV either.
 
Mr_Sukebe said:
Yes, but they’re not huge. My guess is around Fiesta size. More to the point is what you get for your dosh sh
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Thanks. I'm not sure it's a good idea to buy something no-one else wants. If the range is compromised then ok for normal use but not for when she wants to drive further away.
 
danlightbulb said:
Thanks. I'm not sure it's a good idea to buy something no-one else wants. If the range is compromised then ok for normal use but not for when she wants to drive further away.
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It would be no different to the Spring you were looking at in terms of range and a far better place to sit.

If she wants to drive further away, you need to write the Spring off completely as its not suitable.

The depreciation on the MX-30 was horrible because it was a EV with 100 miles range priced like was a segment leading car. The RRP was something daft like £28k.

They are not bad cars, it’s just not 2015 anymore and you can’t get away with launching a car with 100 miles range when your competitors are hitting 200+.
 
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