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If I was in that position - I'd by my kid a decent, probably, new motor for all kinds of variables. A warranted new car has a lot to offer a worried parent from including roadside assistance to maybe a misplaced faith in their reliability. Each to his own.
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Its one thing buying a brand new car when you pass, but my thread was about before they have even passed. Sometimes even after a few lessons. Then two years later they still have not passed and the car has lost £3k, mummy and daddy suddenly realise there will be no dividends due to the recession and are forced to sell the house to pay the loan on the car (ok thats a bit silly...).
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Maybe I have been spending too much time lerking around Corsa and learner driver forum but it seems these kdis get given these new cars then write them off. My cousin was one them, wrote off a £6k Escort by driving it up the M62 with no oil, and the car was given to him. He did learn is his lesson though, his parents did not buy him a new one and he hasn't driven since.
People doing what they like is what started this recession in the first place. The banks only have some of the blame.
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Maybe I have been spending too much time lerking around Corsa and learner driver forum >> but it seems these kdis get given these new cars then write them off
You are generalising. And maybe a little jealous? My example posted was buy for for 17th birthday and they passed a few months later.
Why not get a new car or nearly new if you can afford it? I know I would. And my "relative" paid cash for the Citroen C2. Some of us can pay cash. And they have a fair bit more than me for sure. But the head of a company based across the UK (Scotland, Wales and England) probably would :-)
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I am being cautious, I don't want to struggle with money and a new car would mean I do that. However I am now saving with the aim of buying a brand new car which I can keep for many years and not have to worry about things so much.
Jealous maybe a tiny tiny bit of that :p
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£6k for an escort? i assume this was quiet a few years ago?
Lot's of people especially ones who are given instead of buying a car (new or not)write them off if there a new driver in my experience.
Edited by Pizza man on 14/06/2009 at 09:34
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Have some people just got too much money?
Yes? A close relative's son was learning to drive last year. Got a brand new Citroen C2 for his 17th birthday to learn in. Also got proper lessons. When they passed the insurance naturally went up a lot to drive on their own (more than Rattle's Corsa cost for the insurance difference alone!).
And in September they go to University and do not take the car.
Do I think this was a waste of money? Yes and so does (sort of) the close relative but he is a managing director, has no mortgage, etc, etc. So why not put your son in a decent car? Although I'd have bought a 2 year old car instead of a brand new car in this situation.
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Thats the sort of mad stories that inspired my thread. As you say they could have bought a 2 year old C2 with 10k on the clock for a year and then sold it for a few hundered less when he went to university.
What I have against this is it dosn't teach the children about money does it? I will admit my parents were bad for this too, they never bouught me a car but they did pay around £500 towards my driving lessons many years ago and because I wasn't paying I didn't have my heart in it. As soon as I had to pay guess what I did :p canceled them.
My mates dad is giving him £1000 towards his new car and I have nothing against that, he has proven he can look after a car and is a good driver etc so its rewarding good driving. He drives a car worth £50 yet looks afters it still.
If I had money I would say to my kids I will put some money towards the car but you must get a job and pay me back or something. Then with the money they pay me back I can use it for other things like their education.
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Thats the sort of mad stories that inspired my thread
Rattle, none of your business to wonder and you're jealous. My BROTHER could have bought an older car but didn't. They had only one other car so will make use of it anyway. But if a family has money then how does buying a car differ from all the other things that are not refused?
When you have plenty of money, so lets say earning £80k-100k per annum then you will change your mind ;-)
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My thread was mainly about young people paying for their own brand new cars with limited wages though, the aprents thing has been a side track. If you're earning £80k a year then no doubt the kids car will just go down on the expenses anyway (MPs that it) :D
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Rattle,
It's their choice than - they set their own priorities, the beauty of exploiting freedom of choice.
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Rattle you are jealous I think. These cars do not go down on expenses! So now you're accusing people of fraud?
Think before replying.
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It was aimed at MPs :). I realise that this is one of the few things MPs cannot claim for it was a joke and its not like I named anybody.
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Rattle if idiots didn't buy new cars for too much money all the time how expensive do you think your corsa would cost? My 1995 Lexus LS400 was £48k new i got it for £800 (my sister borrowed it yesterday and didn't believe me when i said what it cost).
True it doesn't go down on MP's expenses they just employ there kids as researchers....
Edited by Pizza man on 14/06/2009 at 09:38
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Rattle,
People have different standards - there is isn't a one size fits all solution - I have three motorcycles worth around 13 grand for which I paid cash (albeit a few years apart) If I had a child I would cheerfully sacrifice those as luxuries to make sure they had decent safe motors - "standards" vary from the basic fiscal one all the way to ethical and moral arguments for doing or not doing something - for some people buying a new car for juniour is the "right" thing to do - for others not. My dad was well paid enough but we all learnt in bangers, but that's because he was from a "prudent" background and we all turned out reasonably well off through our own efforts. Others are different.
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o lets say earning £80k-100k per annum then you will change your mind
Ah but then maybe not !
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I agree with that. I fully understand the point of new cars and will buy one myself even though it will be financialy silly I will keep it a long time and it shouldn't cost any more than the bangers long term. I can even just about understand a parents buying their kid a new car when they pass, especialy if they need the car for work, but before they even have passed? It is quite typical for people to need 100 or more lessons these days (the average is around 50) so an hour lesson a a week and it could take two years to even pass.
Personaly if I was on 80k a year and my kid had just passed their test I would buy then a low milleage one or two year old car but make them pay for the insurance.
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Rattle that's nonsense - My sister's kids passed at 17 and 6 months and 17 and 11 months respectively, they're not petrol heads - neither are their parents, they are just ordinary kids. Most of their cohorts have passed in the same brackets.
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Pug I can't post the forum so I will send you an email link to a leaner forum I am a member off. Also the DSA says the average is about 56 lessons (hour each) plus private practice on average to pass a test. I don't personaly know anybody who passed in less than a year and I know a few who have actually given up as they keep failing.
I lot of it also depends on the test centre as there is a wide difference between test centres and pass rates. Mine was about 28% but I had a lot more practice and lessons than most people at that test centre probably did which is why I passed first time.
You will see from this forum that 100 lessons is very common although I realise most will pass with a lot less than that.
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No problem in you posting the link - I'm shocked at that statistic. Not the norm in my neck of the woods.
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Sent you the email but I will post the link although some parts of the forum are similar to this site so remove it if you wish.
www.2passforum.co.uk/index.php
You need to spend some time on there but you will see that a lot of people need a huge amount of lessons. My driving instructor told me it usualy takes a year, I passed in 8 months with him but of course I had already had lessons years before.
In general the more innercity the test centre is the worse the pass rate but I think nationaly its gone down to around 35% anyway.
I am off out now anyway but to conclude I admit am a tiny bit jealous but my thread was about spending all your money on a brand new car before you've past your test, not really about parents buying good cars for their kids.
Edit regarding that forum it should be ok to leave the link as I know a lot of posts get refered to Honestjohn so its generating traffic to this site too.
Edited by Rattle on 13/06/2009 at 20:19
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People spend their money as they see fit. When it comes to children, some see a private education or extra tuition as suitable. Some prefer to buy a house in a "good" catchment area. Others take the view that they would rather spend their money on other things. It's a world of free choice for now thank goodness. Those who can't afford those choices can't make them for obvious reasons.
I am not rich but am certainly no pauper. I love cars but prefer interesting holidays. I/we spend quite a bit on travel. That is our indulgence. We run cheap cars to balance the financial equation. Buying your son or daughter a decent car might be seen in the same light. Maybe they cut back on other things to afford it? Who cares anyway? Good luck to them if it gives them pleasure.
At the risk of sounding pompous, age does teach you that comparing your fortunes and values with others is a fools errand. Being comfortable with your own choices is a good place to be.
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I think at end of the day it is just the balance, I am not saying I would let my 18 year old kid drive round in a 20 year old Nissan Micra :). Sorry if I got a bit heated.
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I have and I never will own a brand new car - depreciation being the reason.
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A brand new car doesn`t automatically stop worry either Rattle. Forgive my impudence for suggesting it - But i would dump that Forum for something more positive.
I still believe that for most youngsters learning to drive is relatively easy and surely its in an instructors financial interest to whup the whole thing up on forums into complexity - as though it were learning to fly a passenger jet?
(You can get a pilots license for a Cessna I believe in around 45 hrs flying time.)
All the best! (when do you set off for Wales?)
Edited by oilrag on 13/06/2009 at 21:01
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when do you set off for Wales?
Wales schmales. Make it southern Spain or Italy. Take an intelligent girl friend.
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. Make it southern Spain or Italy. Take an intelligent girl friend.
Better still, go alone and find a proper Latin woman full of love, passion and loyalty, marry her and live a good life....understand though that those wonderful ladies are fitted with extra short fuse...don't ask how i know.;)
I don't blame youngsters having a new car if they can manage it, older and not always wiser ones like me couldn't afford anything new, unheard of in my day...but there are a few differences now.
We couldn't afford to pay someone to work on our old bangers, and our old motors were able to be worked on.
Apart from routine servicing, what hope has an inexperienced youngster got of diagnosing and then fixing most modern vehicles, even long term home mechanices are stumped when things go wrong now.
Once you've bought the first car it may work out cheaper in the long run to keep buying new vehicles for non mechanical folk.
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That so topic creep but sound advice.
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Takes all sorts Rattle. No doubt some learner drivers spend all their money or go into debt to get new cars, but I doubt if many do. Either the the people you mention, or their parents, have the loot, or they have good secure jobs and can meet the payments without difficulty.
I think you are imagining a category that doesn't really exist on any scale.
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it's a great shame if soon to be passing drivers are buying new or nearly new cars.
I am going out on a limb here but howdo people learn to drive properly after passing their test.
By 'properly' I mean learning a cars faults when old and learning when a problem occurs
My first car after passing my test was a 1979 Fiat 127.
Plenty of faults but great learning curve. (fixed lots of problems)
I always believe that any car driven by a recently passed driver will get completely wrecked in the first year of driving due to lack of knowledge, crap teaching of clutch use and the odd bit of dangerous driving thrown in for good measure.
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I don't know many 17-year-olds these days who can afford to pay for the 50+ lessons now needed to pass the test, plus the cost of the tests on top. Of course the insurance premiums and car running costs, not to mention purchase price, have to be taken into account too. I believe it has been mentioned on here before that many people are putting off learning to drive as soon as they are old enough simply because of the cost.
It follows (in my mind at least) that a certain percentage of young adults will find themselves in the situation of either having some sort of savings fund mature at the age of 18, or of being bequeathed a reasonable lump sum of money by a relative.
Couple this with the mindset of those to whom driving is a means to an end rather than a pleasureable activity in itself, and cars are merely consumer goods and not something to get emotionally attached to, and the idea of throwing £10k at a young non-driver to get them licensed, insured and mobile seems to make sense.
Dave TD.
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>>I always believe that any car driven by a recently passed driver will get completely wrecked in the first year of driving due to lack of knowledge, crap teaching of clutch use and the odd bit of dangerous driving thrown in for good measure.
I know what you mean - a lot of young lads could thrash a new, lightly built supermini nearly to death in a year even if they didn't prang it first. That said, we bought our daughter a new Ka when she left home at 18 to live away on a pre-degree training year, and our son a new Panda when he became a student nurse and needed transport. The Ka was sold at 7 years old, having been treated with care, and the Panda is now over 3 years old and has also been used sensibly. They both know they won't get another one.
We aren't rich, but we're not poor, or extravagant. As long as we have what we need I'd rather do something for them before I snuff it than after.
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>>letting kids drive a 20 year old micra
I would that way if they trash it it's not written off a biggish investment.
Edited by Pizza man on 14/06/2009 at 09:44
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