Tesla Is Changing the Used Car Game
capitalone.com
capitalone.com
They tend to use oddball parts that are more expensive to get, more onerous to install, and often less reliable overall. Value cars get their reputation from more than just the initial sale price.
You can pay $25k for a used car that cost $50k when it was new, but you will still have the maintenance and repair bills befitting a $50k car. The original owners could afford that cost of ownership, and the manufacturer took that into account when it designed the car.
I know a few people who buy older Mercedes and BMW models and they say the cost of ownership is low, but that's only because they do their own work and don't need to pay a mechanic.
I had excellent service from the one MB I owned (granted I did turn all the wrenches on it, so the costs were extremely low). One nice thing about the luxury German cars is that they are generally designed for a long service life. Things that need to come apart for servicing are generally threaded fittings (rather than push/snap fit plastic crap).
I drive a Ford now.
Not to say that Volkswagen is the champion of reliable economy cars as they’re not, but, plenty of other cars have timing belts.
Also Audi/VW had a stupid tensioner design which made timing belt replacements a requirement at 30k miles until they changed it. I think this is still a grand example of how luxury brands up charge everything because luxury. It costs 450 for the dealer to do the same job on my transverse Ford engine.
At least that’s my observation. They wanted $1300 for a headlight on my 2007 BMW, that cost maybe $8000.
Cost of work to replace it was like $30-40.
Haven't had anything go wrong in the 2 years I've owned it, just regular maintenance that I go to an independent mechanic for.
I find if you follow a few basic principles of used luxury car buying you can avoid a ton of headaches...
- Stalk forums for the model that you want and understand all the serious problems certain model years can have. Avoid those model years, always buy the latest model year of that series (Most issues get solved by the manufacturer).
- Do a PPI (Pre-purchase inspection), it's only ~$100.
- Ask for previous maintenance records / repairs (Avoid cars with accidents or questionable titles).
- Do preventative maintenance and never miss a scheduled service.
- Fix problems immediately as they arise, don't let them get worse.
So far I've owned a fantastic sports sedan that I've wanted to own for a long time, for 50% off.
Parts are shared across vehicle lines and sometimes across manufacturers.
Luxury manufacturers also have invested heavily in the certified pre-owned market which means that to save money they make the cars better initially. Why? Otherwise they have to pay the dealer for the work to repair. Cars are so reliable that even dealers will warranty the power train on a used car for 100k miles for no additional cost (even after negotiating the sale price). That's how confident they are. If you are really worried buy the used luxury car from carmax and purchase the extended warranty.
Consumer reports publishes repair costs. Audis are much more than Honda/Toyota/Hyundai.
You can purchase an extended warranty for your Audi, it will cost 3x what it would cost on a Lexus or Toyota.
It’s a fun car to drive, but it costs much more to maintain.
Again, you have to read, pick and choose the right model. Audi makes a lot of unreliable crap (Or at least used to a lot, in the past) so you need to weed it out.
I'm not planning to replace the transmission on this car, I will most likely sell it in a few years.
The first step of anything to do with the engine compartment is "remove front of car".
They don't optimize the layout one bit for minimizing cost/maximizing ease of maintenance. I have a friend with an RS6 that sat unused for years because it needed some cam sensor or actuator thingy serviced to idle right and pass smog, to do the job required pulling the engine due to packaging constraints. A job like that isn't just expensive, it requires finding a mechanic you actually trust to do the invasive job properly, unless you can DIY.
I'm a DIY type, and that has me firmly in the domain of mass-produced Japanese economy-sports cars. They're an absolute dream to work on. I can change the timing belt on my current car without even jacking it up off the ground let alone tearing the front of the car off, using nothing but a few hand tools.
They do it to discourage DIY type of work, can't say I'm a fan.
Consistency matters.
Anyways, one time I came across a deal on a Land Rover Defender and picked it up. It was the worst decision in my car buying life. Oddball parts, expensive, being broke down waiting on parts to ship from England, where all regular occurrences. I am sure, I put over 10K in replacement parts into that vehicle and those where the ones that actually broke and not parts purchased for restoration.
After that experience I came across a Lamborghini LM002 at a really good price, IIRC it was around 25K when no one wanted the Rambo Lambo and passed on it, looking at the prices now, I kick myself for not getting that one. Though it would have been another nightmare.
Point being I agree stay away from used luxury cars but if that is what you want, it's better to buy used, than new and then have to still foot the bill when the warranty is up.
> a 2018 BMW 320i lost nearly 20% of its value, dropping from $37,700 to $30,700.* While it’s true that newer vehicles typically depreciate at a steeper rate, it’s not usually that steep.
Note how they don't give a source for the claim it's not usually that steep?
Here's people talking about E-Classes losing 55% of their value in 3 years... 7 years ago: https://forums.mbclub.co.uk/threads/depreciation.124585/
If anything their example is actually less depreciation than I'd expect for a 3 series based on trends from years ago . Probably because the 320i is the base engine (non-M cars don't end up retaining that much more value as engine sizes go up). I've seen brand new 1 year old non-M BMWs for more than 25% below MSRP sitting on the lot.
>At three years old, a 2016 Mercedes B-Class would ordinarily depreciate at a slower rate. For the same time period as the BMW above, though, the B-Class dropped from $18,500 to $13,250, nearly 30%.*
Do yourself a favor and google a 2016 B-class (if you don't want to bother, it's a hideous minivan that any US readers have a fair chance of probably never having seen in real life). Even amongst Mercedes's lineup it's a car that rapidly depreciates "above it's weight class".
And the 2016 B Class is now a generation behind, and from the tail end of 7 years without an update. They actually stopped selling here in the US, and in the last year they existed on our shores they sold... less than 200 units.
The lesson here is people who can afford a German luxury car aren't trying to get a hand-me-down luxury car. People who can afford one, and are frugal, are probably buying a Japanese one over a hand-me-down German one.
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Well that and CapitalOne really wants eyeballs with that clickbait title.
Anyone else notice the text trying to get you to use their loan program to buy a car loads, then a loading bar shows up before the actual article does?
Something similar is going to be happening to the rest of the used car market pretty soon. There are a ton of low and mid-range price ev's coming out from many manufacturers in the next few years. That plus expanding charging networks plus increased government incentives mean that many of millions of ice owners will switch to bev's, and that in turn will cause the ice used car market to crash.
Does any one want to disagree? Does anyone want to argue that 10 or 20 years from now ice sales will be doing pretty much the same as they are today?
I was expecting to see something about Tesla’s lease or buyback program with their “resale value guarantee” which I always found interesting and AFAIK not offered by any other manufacturers.
The spare parts are rare and expensive in most times
and lack of supply make you get stuck many times until the car get fixed
Sure, more expensive than standard cars, but I have never heard of anyone not able to find a part immediately available.
Tesla circumvents some dinosaur regulations
It suddenly makes sense
Chrysler pays $TSLAQ to whine about it
Everyone realizes it works really well
Repeat ad vomitum.