An average car costs €1,000 per month

unkel

Linky

There you have it. Owning a car is very expensive for most people. To me that looks like a lot of money to own your average crap car. I would like to either spend only a fraction of that owning a basic car or own a high end lavish luxury car on this average budget of a grand a month

I have managed to own a second family car this year so far (by buying and selling) with zero total cost of ownership. Everything included, tax, insurance, fuel, maintenance, etc.

lalababa

I agree, and think of how many buses, trains , taxis you could take for 11k. If only we had decent public transport:(

bilbot79

Figure seems a bit dodge to be honest

bear1

That just seems way too high.

dudara

That seems really high, based on my own experience. Even if I was filling my tank every week, I'd still only get to €500. Allowing €6k per year for repairs, tyres etc would get me to €1k. And that's very unlikely. Realistically I reckon my car costs me €400/month.

And that €1k is supposed to be the average, which means there are many cars costing in excess of €1k per month.

Can anyone offer a view that supports this average?

Car99

Does the 1k a month include depreciation?

Stheno

Can't understand that figure insurance and tax are about 150, petrol is about 400 on a busy month which is reimbursed through work, and nct/servicing would be 25 a month

Car99

Average car say family saloon, 1.6 diesel, 4 year old?

Fuel for 10K miles per year at 50 mpg €1000
Insurance. €700
Tax €300
Nct every two years, €30 per year.
Two tyres per year average €200
Service €500 (generous)
Odds an sods like car washes , windscreen washer fluid €300.
Total €3030 .
Where does the €12k average come from?
Even if they add in depreciation , not many used average cars would depreciate €8k per year.

Peregrinus

Car99 wrote: »

Does the 1k a month include depreciation?

Yes. The figures assume that you are buying the car new, and they include depreciation based on the price of a new car. In fact this represents about 40% of the total cost, so if you buy a second hand car, which costs less and depreciates more slowly, the figures would be very different.

They also include the interest that you forego by using your money to buy a car, instead of putting it in the bank.

Finally, they include something like 80 euros a week for parking and garaging costs. This must vary hugely from individual to individual, but I would have thought a lot of people pay much, much less than this.

Car99

Peregrinus wrote: »

Yes. The figures assume that you are buying the car new, and they include depreciation based on the price of a new car. In fact this represents about 40% of the total cost, so if you buy a second hand car, which costs less and depreciates more slowly, the figures would be very different.

They also include the interest that you forego by using your money to buy a car, instead of putting it in the bank.

Finally, they include something like 80 euros a week for parking and garaging costs. This must vary hugely from individual to individual, but I would have thought a lot of people pay much, much less than this.

Thanks, so they're saying a new car is an average car when the vast majority of the cars driven by the average joe are used. BS indo article.

Staph

It's a crazy figure, it has to include depreciation. I drive a big tax 2.5 petrol using E400 per month on fuel, serviced every 10000km and it doesn't cost that much.

Peregrinus

Car99 wrote: »

Thanks, so they're saying a new car is an average car when the vast majority of the cars driven by the average joe are used. BS indo article.

The figures are from the AA, who as a lobby group have an interest in talking up the cost of motoring, but they are upfront about the fact that the figures relate to a new car. Presumably the AA justify this by pointing out that every car starts off as a new car.

The Indo obviously isn't subjecting the figures to any kind or critical scrutiny or analysis, but no surprise there.

pwurple

It's a smidge high, but we are low mileage. I will give you my own example though.

I track spending with a speadsheet. All car spends went on the cfredit card so it was simple to record and tot up every month. I averaged my old car costs at 580 per month over two years. Included maintenance and repairs, (and tax, insurance nct, fuel) but not depreciation as the car was over ten years old and effectively worthless.

In terms of costs to us as a family, it came in third place after childcare and mortgage.

It's the main reason we got an electric vehicle nearly two years ago.

Assuming an aggressive depreciation to zero in 3.5 years (or a payment of 480 per month), we still come out less than what we were paying running the old car.
No engine (90% less maintenance)
No petrol tank (90% less fuel cost) - full recharge costs 2 euro on night rate. We Charge twice or three times a week overnight at home.
Tax has dropped from over 800 euro to 120
Inusrance dropped slightly in a market where it is generally rising.
Free parking, free tolls etc on the Drive For Zero scheme in cork, and there was 5k grant and 5k scrappage for the car.

It's saved us thousands already.

EllieK2

bear1 wrote: »

That just seems way too high.

Yeah, to me too. Maybe half of that sure, but I never felt I was spending 11-12 grand a year on my car.

Car99

pwurple wrote: »

It's a smidge high, but we are low mileage. I will give you my own example though.

I track spending with a speadsheet. All car spends went on the cfredit card so it was simple to record and tot up every month. I averaged my old car costs at 580 per month over two years. Included maintenance and repairs, (and tax, insurance nct, fuel) but not depreciation as the car was over ten years old and effectively worthless.

In terms of costs to us as a family, it came in third place after childcare and mortgage.

It's the main reason we got an electric vehicle nearly two years ago.

Assuming an aggressive depreciation to zero in 3.5 years (or a payment of 480 per month), we still come out less than what we were paying running the old car.
No engine (90% less maintenance)
No petrol tank (90% less fuel cost) - full recharge costs 2 euro on night rate. We Charge twice or three times a week overnight at home.
Tax has dropped from over 800 euro to 120
Inusrance dropped slightly in a market where it is generally rising.
Free parking, free tolls etc on the Drive For Zero scheme in cork, and there was 5k grant and 5k scrappage for the car.

It's saved us thousands already.

What car did EV do you run ?

pwurple

Car99 wrote: »

Average car say family saloon, 1.6 diesel, 4 year old?

Fuel for 10K miles per year at 50 mpg €1000
Insurance. €700
Tax €300
Nct every two years, €30 per year.
Two tyres per year average €200
Service €500 (generous)
Odds an sods like car washes , windscreen washer fluid €300.
Total €3030 .
Where does the €12k average come from?
Even if they add in depreciation , not many used average cars would depreciate €8k per year.

It is high. But, 3030 is too low too.

If you ignore depreciation (or the cost of the car itself, or a loan) for a new car, you can add in some rocketing maintenance as an expense as the car gets older instead. Ours was costing 1200 in repairs (Renault laguna). We averaged that a year across two years. Car was 10-11 years old and had nct every year. Tax was more than double the above.

It's probably one or the other... Depreciation cost or maintenance cost.

pwurple

Car99 wrote: »

What car did EV do you run ?

Nissan leaf.

Staph

I wonder is the cost taking into consideration the financing of a loan or PCP? Because that would easily cost E300-400 per month for some people.

Peregrinus

Staph wrote: »

I wonder is the cost taking into consideration the financing of a loan or PCP? Because that would easily cost E300-400 per month for some people.

No. The calculations assume that you have the cash, and they factor in as a cost the interest you lose by not keeping it on deposit at the bank. They don't factor in the interest cost of borrowing the purchase price when you haven't got it.

In fairness, it would be fairly unrealistic to assume (a) that the car is brand new, but (b) that it's bought with borrowed money. Borrowing money to buy a brand new car is a strategy that people would only adopt if they were completely indifferent to the cost of motoring.

PaddyWilliams

Bought a 131 recently.
Road tax €180 per year
€50.00 every 2 to 3 weeks, €1300.00 give or take per year
service cost me €289.00
Insurance about €75.00 per month, €900.00
So €2,669. Might need 2 new tyres, so €3,000 even we'll say

Still a long way short of €11,000 a year though. I paid for it in cash, €16,500. Interest received on that might have been say €350.00 a year after DIRT which brings the figure to €3,350 a year. I don't know how depreciation works so can't calculate that.

Johngoose

I don't pay for parking but I know some people do.If you were paying for a space in an affluent area it could work out expensive per month.

mickdw

My car was costing mad money for the first few years 9 it's life.
It was depreciating by 10k per year approx for first 2 years. Petrol 3k per year. Servicing maybe 300
Tax 450, insurance 750, tyres 600.

total 15k per year or 1250 per month.

now that it is older, depreciation is down to about 2k per year so running cost halved overall.

over 8 years of ownership, depreciation has averaged 5k per year so maybe that is a more reliable figure. This gives a monthly cost of 840, each and every month for the last 8 years.

Peregrinus

The AA figures assume depreciation to nil over 8 years.

galvo_clare

Peregrinus wrote: »

In fairness, it would be fairly unrealistic to assume (a) that the car is brand new, but (b) that it's bought with borrowed money. Borrowing money to buy a brand new car is a strategy that people would only adopt if they were completely indifferent to the cost of motoring.

Most new cars are bought with finance these days. The point is you'll have finance costs or loss of interest costs if you buy outright or most likely a combination of both.
If you trade in a car, you're foregoing the option of selling it and putting the cash in the bank.
I treat these figuees with a large pinch of salt. An average family car might depreciate 4k in its first year and slow after that. Even taking everything into account I don't buy 1k per month.
My own 08 520d was bought new for around 55k. I'd probably get 15k for it now so 40k over 8 yrs or 5k per year which is scary but I'm spending nothing like 7k on other costs.
About 1k on fuel, 800 tax and insurance, another 1k for servicing, nct and tyres and you're out for under 8k per annum on a BMW bought new.

The figures are a tad extreme to be fair but not looney by any stretch.

The depreciating a car like an asset over 8 years is fair enough in business land but not overly representative of the national fleet in Ireland unless you balance the calculation for every 8+ year old car on the road.

Not totally basic, fresh enough car €4000/annum depreciation.
€1000/annum for tax and insurance.
€1700/annum on fuel....... 15k miles at 50mpg.
€1000/annum maintenance.

That's €7700.

PaddyWilliams

PaddyWilliams wrote: »

...... I don't know how depreciation works so can't calculate that.

The depreciation on your last car was whatever it cost you less what you got for it

ironclaw

bilbot79 wrote: »

Figure seems a bit dodge to be honest

Very dodgy.

My tax is €1400 per year, insurance is €1600. Petrol is €50 per week, say 50 weeks of the year:

(€1400 + €1600 + €50 * 50) = €5,500, or €458 per month.

A set of tyres is probably going to cost me that. Service, lets assume a big one at €1500.

So, all in, (€5500 + €458 + €1500) / 12 = €621.50.

I'm struggling to find ways of making up the €378 per month unless I started burning petrol in drums for the laugh. I doubt many people factor depreciation into their annual calculations.

ironclaw

ironclaw wrote: »

........... I doubt many people factor depreciation into their annual calculations.

They still pay it though, it's still a cost.

BreadnBuddha

ironclaw wrote: »

Very dodgy.

My tax is €1400 per year, insurance is €1600. Petrol is €50 per week, say 50 weeks of the year:

(€1400 + €1600 + €50 * 50) = €5,500, or €458 per month.

A set of tyres is probably going to cost me that. Service, lets assume a big one at €1500.

So, all in, (€5500 + €458 + €1500) / 12 = €621.50.

I'm struggling to find ways of making up the €378 per month unless I started burning petrol in drums for the laugh. I doubt many people factor depreciation into their annual calculations.

You have no purchase costs included so presumably it's already paid for. However, if you want to be accurate in your calculation of true cost of ownership you should be including depreciation. Leaving it out doesn't eliminate the cost, it just makes you feel better.

draiochtanois

This post has been deleted.

draiochtanois

draiochtanois wrote: »

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They're some jokers if that's how they calculate cost of motoring

Sam Russell

PaddyWilliams wrote: »

Bought a 131 recently.
Road tax €180 per year
€50.00 every 2 to 3 weeks, €1300.00 give or take per year
service cost me €289.00
Insurance about €75.00 per month, €900.00
So €2,669. Might need 2 new tyres, so €3,000 even we'll say

Still a long way short of €11,000 a year though. I paid for it in cash, €16,500. Interest received on that might have been say €350.00 a year after DIRT which brings the figure to €3,350 a year. I don't know how depreciation works so can't calculate that.

That works out at an interest yield of 3.5%. Where can you get that rate of interest? The most I have seen is 0.5% but most are only 0.1%.

Currently Bank of Ireland are looking at charging interest on deposits over €1m.

draiochtanois

This post has been deleted.

fancy pigeon

I calculated my costs for this year so far. Taking into account absolutely everything I've put into the car, along with servicing and running costs I came up with a figure of €4600.

If I am driving it next year I expect this figure to be much lower, despite the €951 tax and near €1k insurance...

Cee-Jay-Cee

I have a 11yr old Subaru Legacy 2.0 petrol that I bought in April 2012 for €4200. It costs €710 a year in tax and €500 for insurance. I spend approx €40 a week in petrol and do all my own servicing and maintenance. It gets an oil change once a year and that costs roughly €80 for everything needed. It works out around €250 a month all in. It does the exact same job and better in certain conditions (being AWD) than most other cars.

A car only costs you €1000 a month if you want it to.

PaddyWilliams

Sam Russell wrote: »

That works out at an interest yield of 3.5%. Where can you get that rate of interest? The most I have seen is 0.5% but most are only 0.1%.

Currently Bank of Ireland are looking at charging interest on deposits over €1m.

Sorry, was basing it on drip feeding into a KBC Extra regular saver at €1000.00 per month, which gives you 3.5% up to €40,000

Kimbot

dudara wrote: »

That seems really high, based on my own experience. Even if I was filling my tank every week, I'd still only get to €500. Allowing €6k per year for repairs, tyres etc would get me to €1k. And that's very unlikely. Realistically I reckon my car costs me €400/month.

And that €1k is supposed to be the average, which means there are many cars costing in excess of €1k per month.

Can anyone offer a view that supports this average?

Yeah I can, 2 hour drive to work every day.

I do alot of miles. Fill the car 3 times a week at approx €55 each fill.
So for diesel its 55x3 = 165 per week.

Lets say 4 weeks per month and we are up to 165 x 4 = €660

Insurance €50 per month

Tax approx €65 per month.

That brings us up to a whopping €775 per month (Without adding in a cost for servicing etc but for servicing I am doing at least 1 every 2 months and average price would be approx €130 per month) then you add cost of tyres etc and I'm well over the 1000 per month on it.

Tombo2001

The figures are way over the odds but I think the point still stands that a lot of people don't have a clue how much they are paying each year for their car.

For example, how many posts calculate the costs and don't include depreciation......the single biggest cost.

If the figure per annum is €5k, which is quite plausible.....for someone on a circa €50k salary, that means they are spending around 1/6th of their wages on their car. In other words, for every 6 days you work, 1 of those is to solely pay for the car. For me, that is just way, way too much.

Caliden

fancy pigeon wrote: »

I calculated my costs for this year so far. Taking into account absolutely everything I've put into the car, along with servicing and running costs I came up with a figure of €4600.

If I am driving it next year I expect this figure to be much lower, despite the €951 tax and near €1k insurance...

I arrived at the same figure for my own.

Lower tax and insurance but fuel is where the ~50% of my costs are.
I did have an expensive year last year as there were some big jobs that needed doing so hopefully it should be cheaper this year.

Tombo2001

Tombo2001 wrote: »

...........

If the figure per annum is €5k, which is quite plausible.....for someone on a circa €50k salary, that means they are spending around 1/6th of their wages on their car. In other words, for every 6 days you work, 1 of those is to solely pay for the car. For me, that is just way, way too much.

Loads and loads of people on €50k ish salaries driving cars that would depreciate €3/€4k per annum.

They rationalise this by the cheap tax and 50+ mpg and most can't quite fathom why they have no cash most of the month.

Tombo2001

fancy pigeon wrote: »

I calculated my costs for this year so far. Taking into account absolutely everything I've put into the car, along with servicing and running costs I came up with a figure of €4600.

If I am driving it next year I expect this figure to be much lower, despite the €951 tax and near €1k insurance...

Are you including depreciation?

Alanstrainor

http://www.theaa.ie/aa/motoring-advice/cost-of-motoring.aspx

This note at the end really gets me:

Depreciation : Based on kilometres of 16,000 Kilometres per annum, and assuming an economical life of 128,000 Kilometres or eight years

That's it lads, once your car is 8 years old it's time to torch it and get on some of that sweet PCP. :mad:

Kimbot

Alanstrainor wrote: »

http://www.theaa.ie/aa/motoring-advice/cost-of-motoring.aspx

This note at the end really gets me:



That's it lads, once your car is 8 years old it's time to torch it and get on some of that sweet PCP. :mad:

Holy sweet jebus, they reckon your car is good for 128,000 kms :eek:

NIMAN

Sorry but this figure is absolute nonsense.

It's like the ones they through around in the media for getting kids back to school etc. Totally made up to make a good headline.

fancy pigeon

Tombo2001 wrote: »

Are you including depreciation?

It's a clapped out old car I was nearly paid to take away. It won't depreciate any more

Akrasia

Tombo2001 wrote: »

The figures are way over the odds but I think the point still stands that a lot of people don't have a clue how much they are paying each year for their car.

For example, how many posts calculate the costs and don't include depreciation......the single biggest cost.

If the figure per annum is €5k, which is quite plausible.....for someone on a circa €50k salary, that means they are spending around 1/6th of their wages on their car. In other words, for every 6 days you work, 1 of those is to solely pay for the car. For me, that is just way, way too much.

Depreciation is only the single biggest cost if the car is new

My mother bought a 01 Yaris for 500 quid a few months ago in perfect running condition, and as long as she services it, it will still be worth at least 500 quid next year and the year after that

Tombo2001

Akrasia wrote: »

Depreciation is only the single biggest cost if the car is new

My mother bought a 01 Yaris for 500 quid a few months ago in perfect running condition, and as long as she services it, it will still be worth at least 500 quid next year and the year after that

That's not true,
I would say depreciation is the single biggest cost for any car costing over €12k.

Fair play to your mother, but if most people were spending just €500 euros on a new/ replacement car, then I don't think Daimler Benz would be worth €70bn; or BMW AG worth €50bn.

But it does illustrate the choices people have.

Anyone could buy a 15 year old Yaris; and, functionally, it will do exactly the same thing that a new BMW will do - get you from A to B. That's what a car is for.

But you are probably paying a multiple of 100 times more for the new BMW - people really should ask themselves, what am I paying for here -and more particularly, is it really worth THAT MUCH extra......

Tombo2001

fancy pigeon wrote: »

It's a clapped out old car I was nearly paid to take away. It won't depreciate any more

Funny enough, the average age of cars on the road has fallen from 5.8 years in 2007 to 8.9 years currently.

Fairly clear message there that people are copping on to depreciation costs and are not willing to buy new cars to the same degree.

KCross

draiochtanois wrote: »

This post has been deleted.

The Indo is just looking for the sensationalist headline.
Who (or how many) buy a new Band F car?! That has to be a very small minority. Most would be Band B at this stage so €7k/yr is the bracket most would be in, not the €1k/mth.

There are lots of holes and assumptions in how they calculated the figures (writing it off over 8 years, insurance doesnt include no claims discount etc etc) but I think what the AA are trying to do is compare like for like each year so from that perspective I think the figures are a good indicator. i.e. are motoring costs going up/down factoring in fuel costs and insurance etc.

I would not bother reading Indo's article. I'd look at the AA website and see for yourself which bracket you fit into and then adjust a few of the figures to suit your mileage to get a true figure for yourself.

Tombo2001

Tombo2001 wrote: »

Funny enough, the average age of cars on the road has fallen from 5.8 years in 2007 to 8.9 years currently.

Fairly clear message there that people are copping on to depreciation costs and are not willing to buy new cars to the same degree.

I'd say that's mainly due to the recession rather than people copping onto anything

New car sales are up again.

_Kaiser_

Let's see..

Fuel this month = €530
Tax (broken down monthly and paid quarterly) = €140
Insurance = €75
Tolls = €45

That's €790 right away without any routine servicing costs, replacement items like tyres/wipers/etc, or bigger outlays when something goes wrong

But €1100 still seems high and that's even with me doing big miles every month. Unless that includes financing etc?