We didn't discuss this

You made references to buying a new car randomly over a 6 months. Multiple times. Then when one of the came up for sale at 20% off. You went out and put a deposit down. Is that a fair summary?

If so you made it clear you were in the market for a new car. But you absolutely didn't discuss that you were about to make a to make a 5 figure purchase. Which you probably should have if it's a shared expense.

Assume this was a new Elroq or similar.

You just talked about getting a random new car over a period of time. Nothing definite planned, no decision made.

You then ploughed on and bought a car without discussing the car, the price, the deal etc with your wife. Your wife is right to be annoyed - you did not involve her in the decision.

How would you feel if it was the other way around and your wife came home and said she bought a car without involving you.

What's completely lacking from this account is any hint of what your wife said over the past 6 months on any of the many occasions when you suggested that it might be time to change the car, or when you talked about what car you might like to get.

Also completely lacking is any suggestion that on any of these occasions you asked her what she thought, or what she wanted.

You say you discussed this with her many times but there is nothing to suggest that you listened to anything she said. Or, if you did, it doesn't appear you think what she said is important enough to mention here.

You see the problem here?

Now, fair's fair. Maybe the account you posted here is incomplete. I get that this is a fairly informal place and you're venting, not writing an essay. So maybe your wife did have views, and maybe you did find out what they were, and maybe you attached considerable weight to them, and maybe you thought what you were doing was entirely in accordance with her wishes.

But, from the reaction you report, it doesn't seem so.

So, perhaps the answer to your question . . .

How to approach this in the future so the obvious to me is not a surprise to her?

. . . is "Talk to your wife, bearing in mind that talking to someone involves more than just telling them what you are thinking".

The bolts are showing signs of rust. It's 6 years old and has almost 80k on the odometer. Time to go I think.

80K on the clock is nothing. (Km or miles, still low). Rusty bolts? Superficial rust probably, not a cause for concern really.

Seems you just fancied a change and went ahead off your own bat.

In future, talk things through. You have to agree, and sometimes your arguments will fail to convince (like here, I have to say).

to summarise, you bough a new car cos you wanted a new car. and you thought your wife would accept your weak reasoning as gospel, and now your shocked she doenst like her new finance handcuffs.

A simple question

Did you have monthly payments on the previous car or was it paid off?

OP I agree with what others have said but another thing I just picked up on - you said you test drove a few different ones & decided which you liked. If your wife is going to be using this car too, did she test drive any of them? Did she like any of them if she did?

I was getting a company car a couple of years ago & had the list of 3 options on it. I test drove all 3 to find which one I preferred. My partner also test drove 2 of them (couldn't make the 3rd) as he would also be able to drive it & I wanted to make sure that he didn't absolutely hate which one I picked. Now if we'd gone solely on his pick, I'd be driving a car that I didn't enjoy driving at all but he loved it. Like really loved it. I even tried to convince myself to like it because of how much he did.

It's one thing to talk about potentially making a purchase like that over the course of a few months but a very, very different thing to jump the gun on it without a discussion first with your wife.

So to answer your question - maybe have the discussion before you put money down on something as to what you're thinking. Especially if it's a large purchase that is going to have monthly repayments.

I presume that's an Enyaq, which is a 50k car or thereabouts, perhaps even after discounts. A lot of money, 300 per month is PCP rate it's not really 300 a month, it's a 45-50k purchase.

Look she'll probably be pissed for a while that such a decision was made without her, I would be too if my partner did that. It is an expensive purchase, a new Enyaq EV is pretty much a plush purchase despite not having a prestige badge.

Your old car doesn't sound too bad, it's what a 2019 with 80k kms? Should be loads of life left in it and make sure you get a decent trade in if you do plug ahead with the new car!

You really don't need to justify any reason to random people here for buying a new car OP, people do it all the time.

Financially is it 'your' car or a shared car?

Grand, so it's 100% your car, don't see any issue on your end so, you can go out and buy a new Ferrari if you want if it doesn't effect the joint finances.

I just bought a new car with the missus. I'm the sole income into the house and we still sat down and discussed models, pros and cons and settled on something I like but wasn't my first prefence.

Like others, I feel communication wasn't great and certainly hasn't been explained more here. It feels like OP mentioned in passing that he wanted a new car and that any response was milquetoast at best. Dropping more than €100 should really warrant a confirmation in my eyes, although I'm sure this is different for others but a car would fall into that category for 99.99% of people.