With all the recent talk about Jaguars and fancy two pedal,comfy cars it's got me browsing CL. I see great values for 10 year old Mercedes that seem to have a rather high perceived value. I seem to lean toward the quirky...I like the Jags, currently own a P38 Range Rover and an RX8... But why do folks seem to steer clear of the Mercedes. Parts cost? Reliability? C'mon...I've got a British Car...
As an owner of a heavily modified 2003 E55 AMG, they are reliable, the hard parts are easy to work on, but if the electronics give you trouble, good luck. The scan tools are expensive, every module is coded to everything else, and there is minimal documentation for DIY.
Head bolts? 
In reply to mazdeuce: I admire your sense of humor... for less of a man, it would be still too soon to joke about it.
There's no real market for them.
Mostly, if they depreciated like "normal" cars, they'd still be freakin expensive when 7-10 years old, and there are not many people who would pay $40-80k for a car that old. The kind of people who do have that kind of money generally buy new cars. The kind of people who buy 7-10 year old cars are spending an order of magnitude less.
Porsche's mostly an exception because Porsche has enthusiast demand. Mercedes are more or less just cars.
I would not mind having a ten year old C-class at all. They seem to be quite durable cars, and as noted they have little to no market value.
Interestingly, almost all C-class on Autotrader locally are all wheel drive.
Because there is no secondary market for a utilitarian status sedan at 50k that has needs with no warranty. But, there are optimists and merc master techs with 15k to spend.
In reply to Knurled:
BMW 7-series are much the same. 3 and (older) 5 series have enough popularity in the enthusiast market to keep the value of good ones somewhat decent - provided it has a manual transmission. It's funny how an option that generally cost extra when the cars were new is now a value deduct 15-20 years later...
Although not quite as extreme, a used MB is sort of like a Ferrari: if you can't afford to buy one new, you probably can't afford to buy one used.
A 10 year old non-AMG Mercedes generally wouldn't be that bad of an idea. Just remember that if it has air suspension you'd want to keep around $2750 (W221 S-class without ABC) in a separate fund at all times for when the air suspension goes (that will be enough to cover third-party air struts and a third party compressor), and that MB-spec oil is a must, as well as a quality filter (Mahle from Pelican Parts or another legit re-seller). There are probably a few other minor model-specific things I'm forgetting, but those are the big ones.
I think it has to do with (sometimes false) assumptions that parts cost and frequency of repairs mean that people are less likely to take on a used luxury car in case of it bbeing a lemon.
I owned a W210 with over 200k on it, and I did have a couple problems. It had a vacuum leak in the dash which didn't cost me anything to fix, but it was a ridiculous weekend of complete dash disassembly which would have cost thousands in labor at a shop. The duovalve for the climate control failed and gave me hot A/C and I refused to pay $480 for a solenoid.
In general these are purchased new by those in an affluent space looking for modern trendiness and the newest gadgets. A one, or heaven forbid two model old version just shows that you can't keep up the pace. Hence the market for people that want to buy them because they are just plain nice cars, like us, is way down the dollar scale.
10 years and you're already 2 or 3 model changes behind.
They're a status symbol when bought new. Nobody wants a 10 year old status symbol. Except poor people, because it's all they can afford. And then, you're just seen as a poor person trying to class it up a bit, even if that's far from the truth.
They're full of tech that was cutting edge at the time, but is now dated and incompatible or unable to keep up with today's needs. Like all tech, you pay a premium initially, only to watch the value tank over time as technology moves on. This problem will only get worse as vehicles become more and more like rolling tech suites.
No status, expensive repairs (lots of them cause they no longer design to last) and no resale value.
That said, a skilled enthusiast can motor about in comfort and style for not a lot of $$$ if they are willing and able to do their own work. Parts might be pricy, but it is dealer labour that will sink you. Very few luxury car owners want to be involved in whatever magic makes a car work.
One of the car mags did a one year cost-to-own a big Merc and the conclusion is that they could have been in a new leased car for the same cash-flow.
NOHOME wrote: One of the car mags did a one year cost-to-own a big Merc and the conclusion is that they could have been in a new leased car for the same cash-flow.
I saw that and it was stupid. Ok it was good for us that actually have a clue about cars as it will further drive the price of used Mercs down) but still stupid. They paid about the highest prices possible for the service and seemed to be looking for reasons to take the vehicle in for service. It was a joke.
dean1484 wrote:NOHOME wrote: One of the car mags did a one year cost-to-own a big Merc and the conclusion is that they could have been in a new leased car for the same cash-flow.I saw that and it was stupid. Ok it was good for us that actually have a clue about cars as it will further drive the price of used Mercs down) but still stupid. They paid about the highest prices possible for the service and seemed to be looking for reasons to take the vehicle in for service. It was a joke.
I remember that one and felt the same way about it. Definitely a joke.
I've always heard that all of the big German luxury sleds from the early-to-mid 2000s are essentially ticking time bombs that all have some unobtanium system or feature that will fail and cost more than the car is worth to fix. Usually something to do with the electronics. Is that not the case?
Cotton wrote:dean1484 wrote:I remember that one and felt the same way about it. Definitely a joke.NOHOME wrote: One of the car mags did a one year cost-to-own a big Merc and the conclusion is that they could have been in a new leased car for the same cash-flow.I saw that and it was stupid. Ok it was good for us that actually have a clue about cars as it will further drive the price of used Mercs down) but still stupid. They paid about the highest prices possible for the service and seemed to be looking for reasons to take the vehicle in for service. It was a joke.
Keep in mind once again that people who can do ANYTHING to maintain their cars are a very small, and diminishing pool of humans. And by this I mean anything as trivial as putting air in a tire would defeat 75% of the driving public.
For that group, the article was not silly, it was pretty indicative of what it would be like to own such a car.
NOHOME wrote:Cotton wrote:Keep in mind once again that people who can do ANYTHING to maintain their cars are a very small, and diminishing pool of humans. And by this I mean anything as trivial as putting air in a tire would defeat 75% of the driving public. For that group, the article was not silly, it was pretty indicative of what it would be like to own such a car.dean1484 wrote:I remember that one and felt the same way about it. Definitely a joke.NOHOME wrote: One of the car mags did a one year cost-to-own a big Merc and the conclusion is that they could have been in a new leased car for the same cash-flow.I saw that and it was stupid. Ok it was good for us that actually have a clue about cars as it will further drive the price of used Mercs down) but still stupid. They paid about the highest prices possible for the service and seemed to be looking for reasons to take the vehicle in for service. It was a joke.
If you're talking about the cl65 article by Edmunds it was over the top. Even someone who has trouble putting gas in their car could find an independent and do much better than what was listed in that article.
Tom_Spangler wrote: I've always heard that all of the big German luxury sleds from the early-to-mid 2000s are essentially ticking time bombs that all have some unobtanium system or feature that will fail and cost more than the car is worth to fix. Usually something to do with the electronics. Is that not the case?
Not that I've ever seen. The worst electronics issues I've had to work with were ABS faults... and they use the same ABS units as just about everyone else.
And there are places that will rebuild them for a couple hundred bucks.
From my vantage point, a 10 year old Mercedes is cheaper to own than a 10 year old Hyundai.
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