[bhargav2015]

As one who has used VAG cars for a good part of the last decade, I can say with certainty that there are NO CHEAP MAINTENANCE cars from their stables. Hell, when my Fabia Diesel (neither a luxury car nor a German) needed a Water Pump replacement, I felt like someone had sucker-punched me in the gut while I wasn't looking, as I heard the quote (₹32,000/- all in) from the A.S.S.

When I had to change the Clutch assembly, my friend, who accompanied me (and always used Maruti Suzuki cars) nearly fainted on hearing the bill (₹38,000/-)! All this, for a car the size of a Swift/ Figo.

Such being the case, I hope you get the drift of which direction the costs are going.

Even the simple things knock you out of breath. Got decent Korean (nay, not Chinese) tyres aka Hankooks are ₹11,000 apiece for 17 inchers. Batteries, another ₹16k.

Parts - made in Poland/ Lithuania, are cheap NOWHERE. Add to that our weak currency, high duties, and you're looking at you bank account swept cleaner than Rahul Dravid's cover drive.

The ONLY respite, is if you go NUTS (and I mean NUTS without an iota of holding back) and research deep into the nights, work your network, have enough good friends who will get you a good price for your kidney, will you be able to keep costs low. And that's NOT EVERYONE'S CUPPA CHAI.

PS: I haven't seen Mr. Peace-of-Mind in aeons; if you meet him, tell him I was looking for him. I heard he was hiding around the Toyotas.

[carthick1000]

Used luxury cars can turn out cheap if you do the maintenance yourself. The points mentioned by GTO and Jeroen gives a good overview on most things.

For eg. I can share my used BMW experience here in the Netherlands to help some DIY-ers out there.

I bought a high mileage BMW E90 318d (2006 M47TU2 engine) in Sep 2017 and sold it in Sep 2018. In 1 year after driving 43000kms, here below is what I have spent on the car during my ownership. It turned out pretty cheap (when you looks at my usage of 43000kms in a year) since I did the maintenance myself for the most part, except very few times where either, I was too busy to do it myself or don't have expensive equipment eg. aligning. I excluded the taxes, fuel and insurance here as this will be different in India.

Note that it was already a high mileage example older than 10 years, when I bought it. So GTO's estimate of ~2L per year on a 10 year old model is very valid. The good thing in my case is, I bought and sold the car for the same price, but during my ownership term, I made it pretty good to be as my workhorse. And it served well. Also I learnt a lot about BMW and their engineering prowess (and some nasty issues) while doing the maintenance myself.

Pictures from my maintenance sheet (I used 1EUR=88INR for all calculations). DIY column says whether I did it or a specialist did it. In NL, we can hire DIY garages with lifts and also wheel/tire changing equipment, which was very handy in my case. I never went to dealers, as they are prohibitively expensive and sometimes not as good as the specialist. Being in Europe helps, as I could source parts from Germany at a very reasonable price, without any exorbitant import costs.



the car just before selling it:

[spd_tkt]

Having worked with an extended warranty provider in UAE, I sometimes think of setting up a similar service in India. I know that we have few players already like CWI but I was looking at something more on the lines of what Hagerty does in the classic car space. While running the numbers one challenge I found even before thinking of an MVP is the absence on qualified service facilities and staff along with spare parts availability. Too many pricey cars here in India are victims of jugaad solutions that make them unworthy of any further investments. Getting child parts and certain components directly from the supplier is also a challenge right now.

That being said, I am now looking at selling by almost new (2 year old Swift) for a pre-owned car to get rid of the emi and have a more fun to drive option, my Swift is an amt btw, and one of my primary consideration is a 10 year old Vento. Not a luxury car and VAG usually has pleanty of aftermarket options here but even then I am unsure of this gamble! Though I someone who has always used pre-owned cars older than 10 years while living in the Middle East

[BackstraightBoy]

Originally Posted by carthick1000

For eg. I can share my used BMW experience here in the Netherlands to help some DIY-ers out there.

Oh boy, upwards of Rs. 200,000 in a year! That's only in the realm of possibility for someone with deep pockets and for whom money doesn't start being noticed until it hits seven figures, which I'm guessing most people including me considering buying an old BMW aren't. Clearly, there's a reason used German luxury cars fall so precipitously in value. The allure though is such a red herring!

By the way, do you think the expenses might've relented a bit if you had held on to it for another year, considering you had changed many critical things in the first year?

[BlackPearl]

Originally Posted by BackstraightBoy

Oh boy, upwards of Rs. 200,000 in a year! That's only in the realm of possibility for someone with deep pockets and for whom money doesn't start being noticed until it hits seven figures, which I'm guessing most people including me considering buying an old BMW aren't.

I don't think that is a correct statement. You are just converting the money spent in Euros to INR and coming up at that figure. You are not considering the amount that he is earning in the country. For example, the last service of my Range Rover Sport costed me £1400. If you convert it to INR, it comes to roughly INR 140,000. In absolute terms it will seem very costly. In India it will be very costly considering my salary back there. But here in UK I am earning in pounds as well, so relatively speaking the cost of maintenance is not that high. I am not very good with finance or economy, so I might not have been able to explain properly. Maybe someone like SmartCat or GTO will be able to explain in a far better way.

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by BackstraightBoy

Oh boy, upwards of Rs. 200,000 in a year!

Originally Posted by BlackPearl

I don't think that is a correct statement. You are just converting the money spent in Euros to INR and coming up at that figure. You are not considering the amount that he is earning in the country.

Correct. Rs200.000 is roughly Euro 2300. To put that in some context in the Netherlands; a good electric bicycle will cost about the same. The road tax on this car will be about Euro 1000 per year.

It was bought for Euro 4500. A brand new Ford Fiesta will cost about Euro 15.000. After one year, normal use and maintenance that new Fiesta it will be worth Euro 11.000. (I know because we bought a one year old Fiesta not too long ago)

So the depreciation on a new Ford Fiesta over the first year will be more than what was spend on maintenance for this second hand BMW.

In fact, the purchase of the car and the (largely DIY) maintenance costs less than half of what a brand new Fiesta would cost. And it was sold for the same price. And you get to drive in a cool BMW 318i.

Cars over ten years old tend to have very little or no depreciation, only maintenance. We tend to forget to easily, but the biggest cost on new cars tend to be depreciation. That is just money down the proverbial drain.

Jeroen

[fawad0222]

Mod note: Post edited, please avoid quoting entire post for replies, affects readability, especially on mobile browsers. Thanks.

Originally Posted by sandeepmohan

I am not sure if this is possible in India.
=======
That Audi I listed above was a car I keen to buy. I was also looking at a 2013 Mercedes S300L that cost less than the Audi! While I did not end up buying either, its easy to guess the model to avoid.

Thanks Sandeep. So there are solutions around. Perhaps the one our country needs, may require further tinkering to suit the local situation or may be, it has not yet reached that stage where such initiative makes business sense.

Originally Posted by bhargav2015

As one who has used VAG cars for a good part of the last decade, I can say with certainty that there are NO CHEAP MAINTENANCE cars from their stables.
========
PS: I haven't seen Mr. Peace-of-Mind in aeons; if you meet him, tell him I was looking for him. I heard he was hiding around the Toyotas.

Bhargav2015, thanks for your reply. Yes there will always be sigificant difference between the maintenace cost of Marutis vs Skodas or other such brands. But you would agree there is a good difference in the pleasure of driving them too. Hence we need some solution to overcome such difficulties.

Originally Posted by carthick1000

Used luxury cars can turn out cheap if you do the maintenance yourself. The points mentioned by GTO and Jeroen gives a good overview on most things.
====
Attachment 2134102

Carthick1000. wow, you are one lucky man who belongs to the breed of car enthusiasts who can do such DIYs themselves. Really Great! On the lighter side, with your skills, you can start the preowned car support business initiatives yourself

Originally Posted by spd_tkt

Having worked with an extended warranty provider in UAE, I sometimes think of setting up a similar service in India.
=====
Though I someone who has always used pre-owned cars older than 10 years while living in the Middle East

Dear spd_tkt, One of the purposes of starting this thread was to encourage someone with a business mind, who has an epiphany and starts some kind of an innovative initiative in the field of preowned cars. There are always challenges but those who take them on, can hope to succeed.
regards

[carthick1000]

Originally Posted by BackstraightBoy

By the way, do you think the expenses might've relented a bit if you had held on to it for another year, considering you had changed many critical things in the first year?

Given my experience with maintaining that car, may be I could have gotten away with lesser expenses if I would have held it for a year more. Also this is something you cannot predict with older cars. It is better safe than sorry.

I initially planned to see if BMW's are worth it as a tool for my commute and also wanted to keep doing my hobby of fixing cars. That's why I took the route to buy a cheaper car with known work on it, buy it for lesser than market value for a well maintained one, fix it, drive it and then sell it. For someone who doesn't want to take the hassle to DIY things, the maintenance costs would have tripled or quadrupled easily. On the contrary, If I would have bought one more recent and with lesser mileage, then the purchase cost would shoot up 2-3 times more.

Originally Posted by BackstraightBoy

Oh boy, upwards of Rs. 200,000 in a year! That's only in the realm of possibility for someone with deep pockets and for whom money doesn't start being noticed until it hits seven figures, which I'm guessing most people including me considering buying an old BMW aren't.

Coming back to your surprise. This is not expensive if you live in Europe. A relatively newer used VW Jetta or Skoda Octavia would cost almost the same (ownership+maintenance) or more in a year if you drive 43000kms.

[sandeepmohan]

Originally Posted by carthick1000

In 1 year after driving 43000kms, here below is what I have spent on the car during my ownership.

That is a lot of miles for one year! Do you need to pay diesel tax in the Netherlands? We have something called RUC or Road User Charges for all diesel vehicles in New Zealand. It tends to offset the cost compared to a gas engine but makes sense if you drive distances like you have in a year. Otherwise, NZ is 99% petrol for personal vehicles.

I must say that those repair costs are in line with what you'd pay to fix just about any Asian car. German diesels are known to be more dependable compared to their turbo petrol motors.

Good on you for taking up most of those repairs yourself.

[carthick1000]

Originally Posted by sandeepmohan

Do you need to pay diesel tax in the Netherlands? We have something called RUC or Road User Charges for all diesel vehicles in New Zealand.

It is a somewhat complex subject. There are three major things related to tax differences of Petrol vs Diesel cars in the whole chain of buying, owning and using a diesel vs petrol car here in NL.

During buying

Cost of new car = Catalog price (comparable to ex-showroom) + 21% VAT + BPM (which is a tariff based on CO2 emissions of a car. Diesel cars pay a surcharge over petrol cars if they emit more than 77g/km) + delivery charges

See how BPM is calculated here for both petrol and diesel cars:


Costs: Diesel > petrol.

Side note: EVs dont pay BPM until 2024.

During owning

Here you pay something called "Motorrijtuigenbelasting/Wegenbelasting", which is similar to road user charges you mentioned in NZ. This is dependent on which province you live, weight class and fuel of the car. Here diesels pay almost twice the tax for petrol, if they are in same weight class. Since petrols tend to be a bit lighter, they normally come under a lower weight class. In my case of 318d, I paid about 1500EUR per year on taxes. For a 318i, it would be 750EUR per year.

From 2020 onwards, they added a particulate matter surcharge, which adds up 15% to the existing taxes on diesels.

Costs: Diesel > Petrol

Side note again: EV owners dont pay road taxes until 2025.

During usage

Diesel fuel is the only relief for diesel car owners, as it is slightly cheaper than Petrol. Here you will see the splitup (values in Euro) :


Costs: Diesel < Petrol

Now, the interesting part. With all these things going on, since 2019, I am happy to drive my model 3 passing all those showrooms, tax offices and fuel stations with a big

[lamborghini]

When buying a used luxury car, there are a few things one should always keep in mind:

1) Keep aside a good amount of money (Say Rs. 5L) towards unexpected surprises. If your budget is 15L, look for a car at around 10L just to avoid any unforeseen surprises. This amount is over and above the annual maintenance budget.

2) For more mainstream German cars (think 3/5 series segment), do your research on the model you plan to buy - identify common issues, check for them in service history, do a thorough inspection of the vehicle, research on service costs, etc.
For instance, a 3 series may be much more reliable and cheaper to maintain than the C Class.

3) The way I see maintenance:
0-5 years: Approx. 100K/year for routine maintenance, especially if the vehicle has extended warranty / maintenance packages.
However, do your research. For instance a 4 year old Mercedes requires a gearbox oil change during service - which takes the entire service bill close to Rs. 100K - not including other parts that are replaced around this time frame (tyres, brake pads, etc.) depending on vehicle running.
5-10 years: Approx. 150-200K/year average. Bigger expenses include AC, some motors start giving up, rubber parts start deteriorating, suspension will need to be overhauled, etc.
10 years on: 200K plus plus. This is why most of these vehicles are abandoned post this age, unless they have a huge fan following.

4) What could be done to reduce costs?
Find a good independent mechanic who has experience on these vehicles.
Quality is key & they should have a network to source quality materials from - including being able to import the parts which often works out significantly cheaper than the A.S.S. price.
Since these cars are popular globally, there are a host of companies that will make OEM Spec & quality components - brake discs, pads, etc.
That being said : for major work (opening up dashboard / engine) - it is best to visit the A.S.S.

[evil_grin]

Originally Posted by lamborghini

3) The way I see maintenance:
0-5 years: Approx. 100K/year for routine maintenance
5-10 years: Approx. 150-200K/year average.
10 years on: 200K plus plus.

Thank you Lamborghini. This is an extremely useful rule of thumb instead of "maintenance will be based on the price when new, not when used" or "it'll be a white elephant". Those statements don't help us poor folks who have never owned a luxury car but keep thinking about getting an old one.

Originally Posted by carthick1000

For eg. I can share my used BMW experience here in the Netherlands to help some DIY-ers out there.

Thank you Carthick. Nothing like itemized expenditure to give us a good picture.

If you own a C2 segment car, a used (6-10 year old) luxury car might cost a bit more, but there is no way you can keep yearly costs to within 4x of what you're paying now.

Luxury cars moving to EV might help poor souls like us. The majority of expenses on luxury cars are

1. Engine issues
2. Transmission issues
3. Suspension overhauls
4. Tyre replacement
5. Insurance
6. Engine oil, transmission oil, oil filter changes
7. Fuel expenses

EV Luxury cars might become mainstream in the next 5-10 years. Let's say you'll be able to afford to buy 5-10 year old luxury car then.

You'll be able to save on points 1, 2, 6, 7 above which I estimate to be around 50% of the costs that Lamborghini has mentioned. But you'll still have to pay the rest. That is still a lot.

EVs will have their own downsides though

1. Battery will likely require a replacement at 10 years which will be about 30% of the cost of a new car !
2. Range would have decreased a lot.
3. Lower maintenance might result in higher prices for used luxury cars, thus defeating the whole purpose of this approach.
4. Motors maintenance cost although expected to be low initially is an unknown after 10 years.

Plus the fact that you'll have to wait at least 10-15 years to adopt this approach

You're better off buying a low used D segment German car that gives you almost the same experience at a much lower cost. And if you already have a D segment German you know how hard they are to upgrade from because the delta with luxury cars is so small in proportion to the cost difference.

I used to be in awe of luxury cars when I rode a Honda City. After I bought an Octavia, I'm like "Wait is that all you get after spending so much money?"

[stallmaster]

Workshops/ASS make a killing on labour costs servicing luxury brand cars. Consumables cost hardly 7-8k in total per service duration. In this particular instance(link of YT video), the labour cost gets rounded up to 8-8.5k. All for usual filling of oil, checking brakes, underbody, tyres & sundry, which is an extreme overkill in my opinion. 8-8.5k labour charge for the same work which you're doing in an Alto is an extremely unfair trade practice to be honest.

Changing oil, filters, doing inspection of your own car and foamwashing is totally doable in a Sunday morning per 10k kms if you have some basic tools and a torque wrench. For that time and money you invest, you save 8-8.5k+GST per service. That saved labour cost can go into tyre changes, battery replacement, unforeseen repairs, etc. Maintaining a luxury car, heck, any car is doable if you know what you're doing, and have a torque wrench(most important).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uKv461Woevk

[bhargav2015]

Let's look at a Routine Service for egs.:
1. Drain & change engine oil + oil filter
2. Change Air filter
3. Change fuel filter
4. Check coolant level and quality. Drain, flush and replace as required.
5. Brake pads and fluids. Check and replace as required.

For an A6 C6, Oil filter + Air Filter + Fuel filter combined is about ₹ 7,000 in parts.

Engine Oil (Wurth/ Shell) is about ₹960/ litre and you will need 7litres (actually about 6.5-6.6litres). That's ₹ 6,500.

Coolant flush + recharge: ₹2,500.

Brake pads + fluids: ₹14,000 (Front:Febi Bilstein/ rear: Brembo).

That's ₹30,000 in parts. All of the above jobs will take a competent Garage ~ 3.5hours (@ ₹ 1,500 per hour) That's ₹5,000.

Voila, there you go.

Word of caution: what bites you on an old car is NOT ROUTINE MAINTENANCE. IT IS BREAKDOWN MAINTENANCE.

More unique/rare your car is, more sparse its availability and ergo more expensive the parts.
Source the parts yourself, do some DIY and I reckon you'd save about 30% of the costs.

Happy motoring and for the bikers: keep the rubber side down.

Warm Regards

[arighna.dutta]

There are few solutions, cheaper sourcing of good quality or OEM parts for maintenance. To make that possible, move to the country or wherever the luxury car of your choice has been sold in plenty and mostly produced locally :-) or to ensure that you get to travel to those countries often (not at your own cost) to be able to source most of the possible components . Secondly, to maintain them by yourself independent of your location.