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When is a new car a better financial choice?
by dwaltrip 7y ago
When is a new car a better financial choice?
- NullPrefix 7y agoMostly when it's cheaper
- mywittyname 7y agoBuying a car is never a sound financial choice. That being said, if you buy a new car from a company that is known for solid resale value, you keep it for a long time, and you maintain it well, you may end up with nearly the same TCO over 10 years as a used one. Timing can also work in your favor. If you buy a new car when car sales are down, once demand picks back up, the value of your car will rise along with demand. Not saying you'll make money on the deal, but that depreciation can reverse. Take 2009 for example, car sales in the US fell by nearly half. So if you bought a new car for $20k, it might have been worth maybe $13k or so on the used market in 2011, but by 2013, used car prices were going crazy and the same car might have fetched $16k. I've been tracking the monthly value of all my cars in a spreadsheet for a decade now. It's kind of interesting to watch how much the KBB value fluctuates each month.