Matteeboy

To me, this is the ONLY way to buy a car.
Shell out £20k in one go and you're losing about £1k a year in interest.
Get a 0% deal and the dealer effectively pays for the loan.

We got our Astra at 0% (paid 40% up front) and knocked almost £3k off list.

Who else, apart from Vauxhall, does 0% deals?

Thinking about our next car now (if the Mondeo estate comes with a decent diesel, it could be a contender) and not sure who does 0% still.

davegtt

Doesnt Citroen? although theyre not very good

Matteeboy

Should have said - who does 0% BUT ISN'T FRENCH..!!!

Matteeboy

Dave - I very much doubt it.
They are offering 0% because it's a viciously competitive market.
If you could get 0% on 2nd hand cars, you'd be a fool to buy new.

But I'd rather get a new car, kill them on the list price and get 0% too (like we did with our current car). Paying interest on something that depreciates just doesn't work in my (small) mind but shelling out the lump sum means losing potential bank interest on that sum - we can afford it, but I've learned over the years that it's one thing being able to afford something, but another being stupid enough to throw money away.

With Subarus tumbling sales figures, maybe they'll join in soon?!

pslewis

Mazda ........

Nigel H

Kia

News: Week's Best Deals at 6th September

It's just another way of discounting. Sometimes there are ways of getting the same car even cheaper and then doing your own finance at say 7%.

Matteeboy

Nigel - but that would be worse than buying outright (which would "lose" you about 5-6% on the lump sum) and you are paying a bank for the pleasure!

Guess I'm becoming a tight git but it's the details that matter.
Yes we could rush out and buy something "nice" - then lose a load of interest on that lump sum. Or we could get some other bugger to pay that interest for us while we earn on the lumo sum instead.
Double bonus!

fast bloke

Buy nearly new on a credit card than get a MBNA card with 0% for life with 2% transfer fee. Keep the money in the bank and pay it off as slowly as you can. Saves having to buy French cr4p or shelling out 40% deposit

TopBanana

I use:
Depreciation + petrol + servicing + interest + lost bank interest

Depreciation is always the worst.

Petem95

However you are not really getting 0% APR, you are just paying an inflated price on the car instead.

You could no doubt get the car cheaper paying it all off in cash.

Cant believe people actually get taken in by these 0% deals - Carcraft seem to such in thousands with this method.

Matteeboy

Oh yes - born yesterday.
Which is why we got 0% AND almost £3k off list from a main dealer...

Now if we'd shelled out £16k in cash straight up, we'd have lost a decent chunk of interest.

Would you like me to provide some basic sums for you to see so you can work out how much that saved us?

I love it when people try the smartarse patronising approach and it backfires. Those that buy from Carcraft are the most stupid car buyers on earth.
Yes yes, it looks "impressive" paying for the whole lot in cash, but it's actually often a bit stupid.

J4CKO

iTrader: (1)

I think a Vauxhall is the best you can hope for on 0%, its usually Protons and Hyundai's

davyboy

Yep, usually on cars that no one wants or end of model runs etc.

boxst

Subaru have 5 years on the Tribeca (5-5-5-5 on Tribeca | Subaru (UK) Ltd.) and I bought a Citroen Picasso (sorry, French) on interest free.

davyboy

Kind of proves my point......would be interesting to see the sales figures for that car, and used values.

Devildog

Good point.

You can never accurately work out how much you have actually saved buying new on 0% until you factor a whole host of factors including, for example main dealer servicing to keep warranty intact and ultimate resale values.

High street interest rates on 20K savings after tax (assuming 40% band) are not going to net you more than around £1,500 in 3 years, and that's if you are lucky and probably tied in.

Factor in the fact that your savings reduces on a straight line basis for the (albeit zero percent) finance repayments over the period. That means no nice high rate deals and you'll be lucky to net, what?, £500? (if that).

Not a huge margin come resale time. And certainly not a huge chunk of interest. easily beaten buy buying a lower depreciator.

Great in theory, not always so great in practice. Factor in the lack of choice and it becomes even less so.

NotoriousREV

So what is the best way to "own" a new car? Is leasing better taking everything into account?

MattN

3k off an Astra, what was the list?

I managed to get my other half's SLK for £9890 off list, but had to pay in one hit.

Different people like to do things different ways.

Petem95

At the end of the day they have a margin on the car. They might chop and change the deal to make it sound good to you, but they will keep that margin about the same however they package the deal up to the punter.

Nigel H

Mattee

As others have said there are other ways that may be cheaper, that the point I was making. I've found in the past (when buying Fords for example) that I could buy the car way cheaper at Supermarkets than I could in the showroom. That's also the case with brokers. Ultimately the 0% would have been more expensive.

It will depend on personal circumstances as well. If you have savings then the 0% will be worth more to you than if you don't.

I just payed full list for a new Mini and I took out a loan (despite having the savings) and I still think that this will be relatively cheap motoing, given the depreciation with a Mini.

If you're prepared to sit down with a spreadsheet for an hour you can work it out.

J4CKO

iTrader: (1)

Work want me to go permanent, they are trying to give me a Vectra.

Will stay contacting, i.e. can have one but I have 0% interest !

Matteeboy

I guess it worked for us because we had no idea how long we'd own the car. Actually turned out to be a very useful motor so planning on a little while longer (list is just shy of £19k BTW - got a few options) but we could have easily not liked it and sold it after a year - Depreciation death.

I think my main point is that, having shelled out £1000s in interest in the past (young, naive and stupid), it's nice that someone else is taking the hit. If we knew we'd be keeping a car for three years (for example) we could factor all costs in but for the Astra, it worked out well and has turned out to be the easiest, most hassle free bit of motoring we have ever done.

Davy - When we got the car it had only just come out and our model was pretty sought after. We just played a few dealers off against each other and screwed them down. Genuinely think we got a great deal.

Playsatan

iTrader: (2)

But there is a difference between getting a good deal and not being able to get a better deal. What category do you fall into?

Matteeboy

Playsatan - I think I fall into the "able to kick the nuts off any dealer" category with spotless credit rating and ability to pay in cash if needed.

TopBanana

Permiedom *and* a Vectra

J4CKO

iTrader: (1)

Well it might be a Mondeo, or a Focus.

Might be worth it, 7 miles from home, decent wage, Bupa, Share options, bonus etc, but please dont make me have a Vectra !

fast bloke

Dealer doesn't care about your credit rating - they don't provide the finance. Neither do they care about paying in cash. - If you pay cash or take finance, they will still have the money in the bank at the end of the month. They only way to get a 'good' deal is to buy something that they can't sell at list. Make no mistake - they won't sell below a set margin, and if you don't get them to refuse an offer then you haven't achived that margin.

Realistically - as Devildog says, cash, HP, finance, 0%, lease - it probably wont add up to much more than 500 quid in any direction on a 20k car over three years. That is slightly less than 2p an hour. For 2p an hour I would go for a car I liked rather than one which made the numbers look nicer

Matteeboy

Well that's handy. because we managed both.

Dream Weaver

Dealers hate cash in fact, I tried to pay cash for our Civic but they would only take Switch.

Buying a new car whether on 0% or not is not too sensible IMO. Credit doesn't cost much these days, so why settle for some crappy Vauxhall just to avoid a minor bit of interest? Buy a 6 month old car with £4k knocked off list and no miles.