I think its kind of a maturity or age thing maybe.
We have a lot of young guys working at our place, and lot of them are getting a serious salary for the first time in their lives. The non "petrol heads" use it to buy or rent a place and get started on their "path", whilst others of course go out and blow it on a performance car - even though petrol is £5.50 gallon (imp) and they struggle to see more than 30 MPG.
On top of this the insurance is 4 figures ("helpfully" spaced out by the insurance companies over 12 months plus interest
) and because they have bought them cheap they break. One guy recently bought an Audi for £7k and has spent about £5.5K fixing it before he ever got to drive it anywhere. Mind you he is an idiot and "fixed" the wrong thing - replaced the cams when it was the DMF
For that money he could have got a nearly new one with a warranty.
It won't come as a surprise to learn a lot of them have debt - already.
They make fun and call George a "washing machine" but so what ? I bought him with cash, part of that was what I saved on fuel with my Fabia - at least £1.5K of it over 2.5 years. If he breaks he's got a warranty. If he didn't have a warranty he's cheap to fix (clutch is £150 vs £1K+ for a TDI) - maybe even DIY-able. His fuel economy pays for other stuff like taking Mrs A to Paris, and the savings on Insurance will subsidise my central heating bill if/when the snow comes.
So in the Spring when they moan about how in debt they are again with winter heating bills, and car payments / repairs and still live with their parents - I'm still saving to pay for something nice.
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Originally Posted by Ladogaboy
I'm sure they are still getting better mileage than I am, but I wonder what motivation these people actually had when buying those cars.
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You kind of answered your own question there.
The point is valid though, if they drove better they would save more. Having just done a "fast" rush home last evening (without the emergency braking though) the Prius still did well. Maybe not TDI well, but well enough.