ITH Poker Forum

[darvon]

I have taken to watching the UK Top Gear. I love it.

However I am confused when they spout prices, where that slots a car.

I understand that in the UK, under 12K pounds is a cheap little car.
compact fit in at about 15-17K pounds.

However there seem to be a lot of cars at about 30-40K pounds.

I realize Top Gear car distribution doesn't represent normal UK purchasing patterns, but I am trying to infer them to set the context and coming up lame.

I looked on Google that the avg UK new car sold price is 28K pounds.

Average in the US is 28K dollars (1 pound = $1.60)


SO:

1) Why does UK pay 60% more for their new cars than US? Does that mean people buy more used in the UK? Keep cars longer?
2) What does an average FAMILY of four own?


I compare incomes and the 90 percentile mark seemed to be around 45K pounds, but in the US around, $125K.

Why the difference in fractional income for a new car?

[Maiden]

Well I dont drive, but based on observation..

I only know one person who's ever spent more than about 15k on a car and he's loaded (used to run a Ferrari).

Of the people I know that buy new cars rather than secondhand, they are generally bought on HP (Hire Purchase), which bumps up the overall cost, and so they tend to keep them longer.

Families these days..well judging by all cars pulling up at the school in my road, people carriers or 4x4's seem to be the most popular..usually driven by moms dropping off their kid to school, and cant park :p

As for the difference in prices, maybe because we dont actually have a car industry in this country anymore (tho we make them for foreign car companys), maybe there's an import tariff on them or something..I dont honestly know

[nsidestrate]

The new Ford Focus (essentially identical to the model we sell) ranges from 14k to 25k in GBP and runs more or less 18k to 30k over here. Our prices would translate to 12k to 19k in GBP. When you add in 20% VAT tax, which we don't have, the prices look fairly similar to me. It looks to me that they have some high end "estate" model that has no direct US equivalent, so the base model is pretty much bang on the same price when you account for the 20% tax load.

[leofric]

Ave new car price may be £28k but I would imagine that includes company cars which would skew the average. If you add in all sorts of leaseback/ HP deals which are available I would imagine that few people are handing over a hard earned 28k in cash for any car. Seems even more odd when you consider that last time I looked the average salary pa was around 30k.

I'm also guessing in the UK we would pay more since we have little or no car manufacturing left in this country. Hence we import more - hence we pay more.

And my family of five are all comfortably seated in a Skoda Roomster (cost originally around 12k)

[darvon]

OK. Let me summarize.

The 28K pound average may be more skewed by fleet cars in UK than in US, accounting for some of the disparity.

Families buy 4x4s and People Movers (I think these are what we call MiniVans in the US, i.e. cars that aren't SUVs but have 3 rows of seating)

Similar cars are more or less similarly priced UK/US, except for VAT.

Many people buy cars "Hire/Purchase" which I assume is Lease/Purchase (US doesn't have an analog in cars). HP have long terms.


OK.

What are some UK models of people movers and 4x4s?

[nsidestrate]

What are some UK models of people movers and 4x4s?

You can't do apples to apples with Ford. They sell a minivan called the Galaxy, which has no direct US equivalent. I thought they called them MPVs in the UK (multi-purpose vehicles). I believe the range runs C-MAX, S-MAX and then Galaxy.

The C-MAX is built on the C1 platform, which is intended to be the base compact car platform for all of Ford, but the only one we have is the new Focus. The C-MAX is roughly comparable to the Escape in size, but not really in trim out. I'm pretty sure they plan to sell it over here next year, but only the fancy version. The S-MAX is more or less the same size as the Edge, and the Galaxy is closest to the Explorer (more or less the same wheelbase, but the Explorer is 8 inches longer). Europe has no equivalent to the Flex or the Expedition. They just don't sell vehicles that large over there. They also sell a ton more manual transmissions, which are essentially unheard of in US minivans.

It gets weirder in 4x4. They sell (very few of) a truck they call the Ford Ranger in a 4x4 model over there, but it bears no resemblance to the Ranger sold here. It is actually a Mazda truck not sold here, engineered by Ford Australia. They also sell a small 4x4 called the Kuga which is sort of a tarted up Focus. No real US version of that one either -- at one point it was supposed to come over with the C-Max, but they determined it would cost too much over here because the exchange rate sucks.

I assume that the dominant makes of 4x4 would be Japanese over there. I know that the Nissan Frontier sells a lot of trucks in Europe, but as another name I'm too lazy to look up. Toyota has the RAV4 and Land Crusher over there and a different truck than the one they sell here. You've also got the Range Rover/Land Rover, BMW Xseries, Volvo and the aforementioned Skoda (not sold here).

I'm pretty good at UK cars because their Top Gear is the best car show on TV ever.

[PauliF]

I dont even have a driver liscense and I watch top gear

here is the thing though... I am actually finally taking lessons... my plan is to buy myself my first car by next April for my birthday... I am hoping to get a couple of months early...

I would love you guys to suggest what I should get

can spend up to 6 or 7k cash... for a used car presumably...

or get a car for up to £200 a month HP

any recommends?

ps I like gadgets...

[Piemaster]

Actually family hatchbacks are probably the most popular cars here. The Ford Focus is the biggest selling car and others such as the Vauxhll (GM) Astra, Volkswagen Golf, Honda Civic, Toyota Corolla and Mazda 3 are also popular.

It's true that there are a depressing number of 4x4s on the road these days though

[leofric]

I would love you guys to suggest what I should get

can spend up to 6 or 7k cash... for a used car presumably...

It does depend on what kind of car you're likely to want - plus you need to factor in that bigger cars might cost more in insurance/ servicing.

Second hand - Nissans seemed good value last time I looked as did Peugeots. I could also throw in that a lot of Skodas are basically VW with a different badge but a lot cheaper.

Of course if you throw car auctions into the equation a whole new world opens up!!

(Oh and Top Gear is ok assuming you like watching old men bickering over which car you can never afford is better than any other car you cant afford)

[fatshaft]

I would love you guys to suggest what I should get

can spend up to 6 or 7k cash... for a used car presumably...

It does depend on what kind of car you're likely to want - plus you need to factor in that bigger cars might cost more in insurance/ servicing.

Second hand - Nissans seemed good value last time I looked as did Peugeots. I could also throw in that a lot of Skodas are basically VW with a different badge but a lot cheaper.

Of course if you throw car auctions into the equation a whole new world opens up!!

(Oh and Top Gear is ok assuming you like watching old men bickering over which car you can never afford is better than any other car you cant afford)

Which I do

It's fair comment though that it's long since ceased to be a car show. Fifth Gear fills that slot, though even they have gone very "top geary" in an attempt to keep up.