Love the Swift, alway a good drive. Cheap to own, generally very reliable and cute. Only tiny boot spoils the show. Would I pay £20k or so for one? No, because I’m not mad. Buy it used, once the trade has corrected the value.
Even used Suzuki prices are mad. Consider the Celerio the wifes Uncle had.
Bought in August 2019, new price was approx. £8500 (inc metallic) but that was academic since no new cars were available (car had just been withdrawn) but plenty of pre-reg ones. We picked up a late December 2018 car, 9 miles with metallic for £6995 drive away inc first service, bargain.
Resale was not a consideration but when we sold it in October 2023 (uncle lost his license due to dementia but he had already stopped since he could not walk to his garage) we got £5100 for the dealer we bought it from.
That is a loss of about 40% from new over almost 5 years which was way better than I have ever experienced. Similar cars were on the forecourt for about £7000, pretty much what we paid 4 years earlier.
The current market is still crazy, how is selling a 5 year old car for what it cost 4 years ago "corrected" value?
Great for us but I feel sorry for the new owners, when values are corrected they will have to take a huge hit when they sell.
Indeed - the small / basic end of the used market, especially older cars that are ULEZ compliant, has gone nuts since the start of the Pandemic. Whilst the average second hand price of cars has jumped by about 30% (though now starting to reduce again), this sort of car has often jumped in price by 100% from the historical norm, maybe more.
My dad got £1200 in px for his 08 plate near base level Fiesta 1.25 around a year ago, the only problem was he paid much more for its replacement, so he was probably £3k-5k out of pocket compared to normal times.
I suppose that such a lack of supply will have a huge knock effect down the line, especially as inflationary pressures have had such a huge impact on most people's finances of late just about everywhere in the Western world.
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