It appears our 9 year old Fiat Punto is on its way out – after buying it a new battery (£40) and putting it in, we checked it worked. White smoke started coming out the exhaust. We then checked the oil dipstick and it looked like chocolate milk – a sign the head gasket has allowed anti-freeze to enter the engine. Research on the internet showed a new head gasket would cost between £300 and £450, but since anti-freeze has already entered the engine, it might need to be stripped down which would cost a lot more.
So, we decided to see if it was economical to replace it with another car (2nd hand or brand new) or whether to use hire cars/car clubs: we make around 14 trips a year (6 trips to Yorkshire @ 200miles each way, 6 trips to Leicester @ 100 miles each way, 4 trips to see friends @ 40miles each year = 3920 miles total: say 4,000miles for “spare”) and we live close to London so it might be worth it…. Here’s our figures:
| Yearly running costs for the car |
| Road Tax |
£130.00 |
| Insurance |
£304.00 |
| M.O.T. |
£50.00 |
| Breakdown cover |
£30.00 |
Total fixed yearly costs
(exc Petrol and repairs) |
£414.00 |
| Petrol on 4,000 miles a year based on 5.7litres/100km at 116.8p/litre [4000 miles= 6437km/100= 64.37*5.7litres= 367 litres per year * 116.8] |
£428.66 |
| Repair costs (guestimated average) |
£250.00 |
| Total costs |
£1,092.66 |
Ouch! But how much would it cost for a hire car for the same sort of period?
Well, the journeys to Yorkshire and Leicestershire are typically weekend ones, so we’ll need to hire a car on Saturday morning and returning it Monday morning (as car hire places usually close at 5pm on Sundays – if they are open at all – and that’ll be too early). Avis has cars at £75.47 per weekend. The friends trips are same day, during the week, and that’s £110.00 from Avis – although I found another local company offering car hire for a single day at £40.00 and Streetcar offers £49.50 – so we’ll say £50 for a day).
So that’s
| 6 * 2 (14) weekend trips @ £110 each |
£1,540 |
| 4 one day trips @ £50 each |
£200 |
| Total hire costs |
£1,740 |
| Petrol on 4,000 miles a year based on 5.7litres/100km at 116.8p/litre [4000 miles= 6437km/100= 64.37*5.7litres= 367 litres per year * 116.8] |
£428.66 |
| Total costs |
£2168.66 |
Even without adding petrol on top (most hire car places want you to pay for the petrol as well) – it’s already more expensive then owning a car (even taking into account repair costs!).
If we were to buy a second hand car for £1,500 (we’re actually looking at a third of this) and taking into account this “capital expenditure” the prices per year would be:
| Running costs |
Year 1 |
Year 2 |
Year 3 |
Year 4 |
Year 5 |
Year 6 |
Year 7 |
Year 8 |
Year 9 |
| Buying 2nd hand* |
2592 |
3685 |
4777 |
5870 |
6963 |
8028 |
9121 |
10214 |
11306 |
| Buying new car* |
8902 |
9685 |
10617 |
11600 |
12583 |
13565 |
14548 |
15531 |
16513 |
| Hiring a car |
2168 |
4337 |
6505 |
8674 |
10843 |
13011 |
15180 |
17349 |
19517 |
* = Second Hand card purchase price estimated at £1,500
* = New Cars do not need an MOT for the first 3 years of their lives. We’re looking at a Toyota Aygo which costs £8,220 “on the road” price, is taxed at “B” rate (which is £20), does not need any tax paying for the first year (this is included in the “on the road price”) and includes 1 year breakdown cover. Repair costs are estimated at £50 for the first year, £100 for the next year and then £250 for each consecutive year.
So as long as the car lasts us more than 1.5 years, it is more economical for us to have a car that sits idle for over 91% of its life than it is just to hire cars “as and when needed”. Even buying a new car is cheaper than hiring over 7 years.
Quite shocking and saddening really….