Advice on new car/scrappage deals

Dazem

So, here’s the background. Current car: 2004 BMW 316 – 79000 miles on clock – NCT and tax is due to be renewed in July. Have owned the car for a few years and have had intermittent problems with oil leaks – spent a bit of money fixing these and seems they are sorted now. Had it with the mechanic recently for a quick look prior to NCT and he has advised that the emissions are high (possibly burning oil) and the clutch “may be going”.
Have been toying with the idea of a new car on PCP with a scrappage deal but was hoping to wait ‘til new year to make decision. Given the mechanic’s opinion on the car and the scrappage deals for a 162 at the moment (Hyundai/Nissan) I think I might have to bring my decision forward!

I guess I have three options and would appreciate any opinions or advice that might help inform my decision:

1 Keep the BMW for a year (if it passes NCT) and save a good deposit for a new car – not sure how practical/realistic this option is and I really don’t want to spend any more money on this car!

2 Trawl the dealers who are offering scrappage and see what the best deal I can get is and finance through the car dealership, e.g. PCP, etc. – have never had to do this and feel completely out of my depth – like the guy on the bus who didn’t know what a tracker mortgage was!!

3 Get a car loan through bank and buy an older car – having always had an “older” car, i.e. never anything newer than 5 years old I am not sure how much sense this makes.
I have recently added an extension to the house so savings are pretty much zero – however we could easily afford to pay €300-€400 per month for a car loan or PCP going forward and I don’t think getting credit would be a problem…in other words, I don’t have a large cash deposit ready.

I like the Hyundai’s – perhaps an i30 (though husband would like a Tuscan) – don’t have any idea about Nissans

Any advice much appreciated - thanks

Atlantic Dawn

Scrappage deals for 162 will likely only run the next 2 months or so and then it will be January for the 171 offers will kick off so that's your window to decide.

The PCP has advantages but when it comes to 3 years time you will be back to square one with no car to show for it if you can't stump up the final payment or deposit to start a new PCP.

Dazem

Atlantic Dawn wrote: »

Scrappage deals for 162 will likely only run the next 2 months or so and then it will be January for the 171 offers will kick off so that's your window to decide.

The PCP has advantages but when it comes to 3 years time you will be back to square one with no car to show for it if you can't stump up the final payment or deposit to start a new PCP.

Yep - you make a good point around the future options on PCP. However, I think we should be in a better financial position at that stage to either pay off the lump sum or pay a new deposit. We are restricted on deposit at the moment because we used savings to pay for an extension.

BTW - with PCP do the use the "future value" as part deposit towards a new car if you want to trade up after 3 years or how does that work?

FanadMan

Atlantic Dawn wrote: »

Scrappage deals for 162 will likely only run the next 2 months or so and then it will be January for the 171 offers will kick off so that's your window to decide.

The PCP has advantages but when it comes to 3 years time you will be back to square one with no car to show for it if you can't stump up the final payment or deposit to start a new PCP.

Hyundai scrappage ends at the end of June.....been looking into buying from them

grogi

FanadMan wrote: »

Hyundai scrappage ends at the end of June.....been looking into buying from them

And then, because of the demand, we are extending it for another month!

An old trick, create an atmosphere of urgency...

Dazem

grogi wrote: »

And then, because of the demand, we are extending it for another month!

An old trick, create an atmosphere of urgency...

I know!! I guess there is some urgency for me in the sense that my NCT and tax are due in July anyway, but point taken. There will always be some deal to be had.

FanadMan

grogi wrote: »

And then, because of the demand, we are extending it for another month!

An old trick, create an atmosphere of urgency...

Lol.....probably. But I'll have to deal before end of month. Car I'm driving prob won't last another month.

vistaphotos

Atlantic Dawn wrote: »

Scrappage deals for 162 will likely only run the next 2 months or so and then it will be January for the 171 offers will kick off so that's your window to decide.

Hyundai scrappage offers for 161 ran from at least November through to March 16th. They were due to finish at the end of Nov, Dec, Jan & Feb in turn and kept getting extended

Jack lemmon

Dazem wrote: »

Yep - you make a good point around the future options on PCP. However, I think we should be in a better financial position at that stage to either pay off the lump sum or pay a new deposit. We are restricted on deposit at the moment because we used savings to pay for an extension.

BTW - with PCP do the use the "future value" as part deposit towards a new car if you want to trade up after 3 years or how does that work?

It's the guaranteed future value minus the actual future that you can use as next deposit.
So if the gfv is 10,000 and the car is worth 15,000 in 3 years you'll have 5,000 to use as deposit.
If the new car is 30,000ish your better off paying about 15%(€5,000ish) pcp deposit and higher monthly then you'll always have the next deposit in the cars value minus the gfv.
If you pay 30%(€10,000) deposit and lower monthly, you'll never have that much value in the gfv minus the actual value in 3 years time.
If you want to buy the car outright at the end of the pcp you pay the gfv.