Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
In article ,
John Rumm wrote:
The manufacturers are also compelled to repurchase any cars they have
sold if the owner requires it. There MoT equivalent is also very
expensive to put a car through. Hence a supply of good low mileage
stuff making its way to anywhere near. They can be quite cost
effective bringing them to the UK as well. You get better choice of
models than from the UK official importers, and much better prices.
You will pay more for insurance though.

I've read that Japanese home market cars may not be protected from
rust etc as well as their export ones - since they are not expected
to have to last as long.

I both doubt and hope that's not the case. My son's bodyshell is in
remarkably good nick. The car was 10 years old with only 70,000km on the
clock. Engine sweet as a nut , so far!

Doctor Drivel wrote:

Half way around the world? I have never seen any for sale. There again
I never looked for one.

If you see a Japanese manufactured car, and the rear number plate is
almost square with 2 lines of text, it is almost certainly an import.

Andy

"Dave Plowman (News)" wrote in message
...
I really can't believe any new car makes sense economics wise when you
take depreciation into it.

Nor can I. It still puzzles me why depreciation is so high in the early
years despite modern cars being much more reliable and rust resistant than
in the past. My June 2001 2.0 Focus ESP cost me £6500 in March 2004 when it
was just under 3 years old (half the new cost) and is worth about 3.5k/4k
now 3 and a half years later. It's had front pads, wiper blades and an oil
change (£50 total maybe) in that time and touch wood nothing has gone wrong
other than the reversing light has just stopped working. Corroded connection
to the bulb holder it seems but I can't be bothered to look at it further
just now.

Other than a couple of years without needing an MOT I can't really see what
a brand new one would have done better. Mine still looks and drives as new
and depreciation has been about £800 a year. I did espouse bangernomics for
a while, buying cars about 10 years old for £1500 or so and running them for
3 or 4 years until they dropped but the extra few quid a year to have
something very much nicer and totally reliable is well worth it.

I can't see me changing it for at least another 3 or 4 years because it does
everything I want a car to do (could be a bit quicker maybe) and Focuses
seem to neither rust or break down. Chatting to a bloke at a Ford main
dealer a while back when I was getting parts prices for something else I
asked him out of interest what the main things were that they saw going
wrong on Focuses. He thought for a bit and concluded nothing. In the 9 years
they've been selling them hardly any have come back with serious faults,
they've never had an engine or gearbox apart and even the suspension bushes
aren't the regular 40k mile pain that they were on the Mondeo. If you're
lucky the first time you'll have to look at anything is a cambelt at 100k
although I think I'll do mine a bit before that. Rear wheel bearings are
about the only thing that sprang to his mind.
--
Dave Baker - Puma Race Engines

On Mon, 17 Sep 2007 20:19:53 +0100 Dave Plowman (News) wrote :
I really can't believe any new car makes sense economics wise when you
take depreciation into it. Much more so if you do lower than average miles
- which you hint at if you never need to buy tyres. And does the few quid
an MOT cost really bother you?

TBH I'm at a stage where I value freedom from hassle. I have a great car
that just works - never go near the dealer except for the annual service.
Also I run it as a company car, and so at a personal level pay tax on just
15% of the purchase price as it's in the lowest CO2 bracket. So it actually
costs me £13p.w. + petrol and the company around £2K for depreciation, tax
and insurance, but that is set against profits.

--
Tony Bryer SDA UK 'Software to build on' http://www.sda.co.uk