Millions of people buy cars every year, but how many motorists stop to think whether or not it is actually a good investment to own an automobile outright?
To help you to decide whether to buy or lease your next vehicle, here are a few points to take into consideration so that you do not end up making a mistake.
Dealing with depreciation
Unless you are spending millions on a classic Ferrari that is only going to get more valuable with time, any car purchase you make will invariably be hit by depreciation pretty quickly.
The old adage about a vehicle’s value being cut in half as soon as you drive it away from the dealership for the first time is not far from the truth; within three years you can expect its value to have fallen by 50 percent.
Some automakers’ offerings will depreciate more slowly than others, but ultimately there is nothing you can do to escape this. Thinking about buying a car as an investment is, therefore, a misleading idea in the first place.
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Accepting other risks
As the outright owner of a car, you also have to bear in mind the responsibilities that come with this status. You must keep your car roadworthy, ensuring it passes its MOT where applicable, while also coping with repairs and general maintenance. Once the manufacturer’s warranty has expired, you will be left to bear the brunt of these costs yourself. If you are planning to hold onto a car for a long time and therefore do not care about depreciation, the chances of having to pay through the nose to keep it up and running will be incredibly high.
Looking for alternatives
Leasing a car rather than buying it is a hugely popular option that makes sense for a lot of reasons, with sites like leasing.totalmotion.co.uk/ providing car leasing Leicester residents can use to their advantage.
By leasing a car you can effectively rent access to it for a fixed period, then return it and upgrade to a new model once the contract is concluded. You can, therefore, avoid the issues of depreciation and the costs of repairs in the event of a fault, while also benefitting from cutting-edge safety and entertainment features that are added to the very latest vehicles.
