Dave Thornton

OK, so not quite free, but I am working through a scenario where I will do 4000 private miles and 4000 business miles in 6 months and get 45p a mile for the business miles i.e. £1800 income.

So I'm thinking it may be possible to buy a secondhand car that I can do 8000 miles in for £1800 total cost including depreciation?

Assume insurance would be £150 max for 6 months, and that I 'may' be able to find a car that's got long service intervals, most of a year's tax and good tyres to require £0 in this area. And assume that I get the funds via a 0% credit card so that's 1.5% fee max i.e. £105 on a £7000 car.

That leaves me around £1050 for fuel for 8000 miles at 50mpg and £500 for depreciation/unexpected bills, or less if mpg is worse. I would need to buy at trade price and sell privately.

If this were to work, the car would need to be:
a) economical
b) very low depreciation
c) reliable
d) easy to sell privately

Oh, and it would be good if it was nice to drive and needs 4 seats.

Thoughts on the idea?
Cars to consider? BMW 118d M Sport?

Cocker

iTrader: (3)

Toyota Aygo/C1/107

We sold our one for £200 less than what we paid 2 years ago

Dave Thornton

Good result and it proves that it's possible. However, I am hoping for something a little more suited to long journeys and hopefully more sporting.

Anybody else got any depreciation-busting stories?

Kev_turbo

I managed to run a certain Merc ML430 for 21 months and sell for £500 less than I bought it for. Sold it on ebay and bidding went wild

Dave Thornton

Ah, that's good to hear. Not sure anybody makes a petrol V8 with 7 seats now. I ended up buying a Discovery 3 about 10 miles from you!