What are you really buying when you buy a brand new car?

You're not gonna like this Frenchy but I had an '82 Toyota Starlet that I bought for 200 bucks from an impound auction.  In it were a child safety seat and a leather jacket.  The thing was a total beater but nothing short of an anti-tank round will stop one.  I sold the jacket and the seat for $150 total.  The car was hit three times in minor accidents which paid off about $1,500 bucks total.  I put some tires on it, brakes, and a comprehensive tune-up.  One day I noticed some oil seeping out from the head gasket area.  Spent 48 whole dollars on a head set, plus another 25 for a head resurface (this was around 1997).  I sold the car after four years for $200.
 

Had an '89 Sentra I bought for $350 at the same auction.  Did the usual plus a front crank seal and suspension bushings.  Owned that one four years until it wouldn't pass smog without a new cat, then sold it back to the state for a grand.  This car got me a side job rebuilding a GA18i for a guy that put a grand in my pocket.

A friend gave me an '83 SAAB 900 Turbo for free when she couldn't start it.  I replaced the rubber intake coupler for 37 bucks and enjoyed that one for three years.

For the record, I probably wouldn't do this in the Great White North.  Not because of the weather.  I've worked on cars outdoors in -24F with a wind chill of -58F.  The rust would stop me dead.  I watch the repair videos from northern garages to remind myself of what we dealt with in New England.  I'm lucky to live in a state where the car doesn't fuse itself together over time.  If I did live in New England, a decent driver can be had for the price of a car, a plane ticket, and gas for the ride home.

People work the figures over and over to figure out what makes sense for them.  This is what makes sense for me and a few other folks.  I respect anyone who can fork over large amounts of money for cars.  I'd rather not.

I only screwed up once.  Bought an '88 Toyota Camry with a four cylinder and a manual 5-speed for $250.  The previous owner was Satan.  This car was hurt in ways that would take an entire post to outline.  All of it done by a PO with no mechanical ability and fewer tools.  I had about 80 additional bucks in it when I decided to punt.  I drove it to the junkyard and got $250 for it.

I have more car stories like the '86 Honda Accord I bought for the price of two parking tickets but we'll save that for another time.

When I buy new its because the target purchase is a performance car.  I like knowing the beast was not rode hard and put up wet by the previous owner.  Looking new currently because my last new car was 1991.

OBTW, I have a fleet of DD that were bought used.

I bought 2 cars new, and in both instances felt that the value proposition was better new: ie, the used vehicles weren't listed at enough of a discount to be worth buying used.

Found a great deal on a Fiesta ST, that was selling new for less than most used ones. 
 

The other was a new Grand Caravan: a fantastic deal on a low optioned "Canadian Value Package" had it out the door for under 20k CAD at a time when 2-3 year old used vans were selling for 25k. 
 

In both instances, I sold the vehicles earlier than anticipated, but the monthly cost was surprisingly not that significantly different than buying an old beater. (I track all ownership costs for my vehicles on a per month and per km basis)
 

With used prices today, am considering again buying a new family car for very long term ownership. We like to do long trips to empty areas.

In reply to Jerry From LA :

Our best daily beater was when the wife was driving 100 miles per day 5 days a week getting her masters. Bought her a 2000 Accent 5-spd sedan with a bad wheel bearing for $2k with 103k miles on it. Drove it home, spent $70 for a new bearing and hub.Had that car for almost 7 years, we put over 150k miles on it, then sold it for $1000 with hail damage, AC clutch bearing screaming, rear windows stuck shut (broken regulators), one missing door handle. That car averaged 39mpg from the time we bought it until we sold it and all in cost us something like 4 cents per mile. It was crazy. But that was when you could still get lower mileage Hyundais cheap and run them into the ground. Those days are past sadly. 

bobzilla said:

In reply to Jerry From LA :

Our best daily beater was when the wife was driving 100 miles per day 5 days a week getting her masters. Bought her a 2000 Accent 5-spd sedan with a bad wheel bearing for $2k with 103k miles on it. Drove it home, spent $70 for a new bearing and hub.Had that car for almost 7 years, we put over 150k miles on it, then sold it for $1000 with hail damage, AC clutch bearing screaming, rear windows stuck shut (broken regulators), one missing door handle. That car averaged 39mpg from the time we bought it until we sold it and all in cost us something like 4 cents per mile. It was crazy. But that was when you could still get lower mileage Hyundais cheap and run them into the ground. Those days are past sadly. 

I've had some pretty good luck with beaters myself. I found a 1998 Accord with 183k miles that supposedly had rod knock. The owner gave the car to me for free, I did a valve adjustment, drove it for 8000 miles then sold it for 1500$. I also recently had a 2001 Nissan Maxima I got for 800$ with 72000 miles on it. Owner thought the transmission took a dump and 42.75$ and a transmission speed sensor later I had a nice operational car that I drove for about 8000 miles before I sold it for 3500$. Those days are absolutely gone though. Cherish what you have!

Haha Frenchy this is not the forum for saying "don't tell me about that cheap car you got that lasted a long time for little money". You're in the wrong woods for that to work. I have many such examples in mind without even trying:

$350 Neon that needed a power steering pressure sensor -- still on the road 12 years later

$500 Prelude that needed the custom headlights removed so it would stop popping fuses -- had it a couple years, saw it on the road over a year after selling

$200 Bronco 2 with a bad starter, NOT a bad trans, as the PO said -- gifted it to BIL and it was given up on because of a bad ground >:(

$FREE Sentra that needed a new strut to get driving -- had a couple years then donated while still running

$FREE Accord with a CEL and busy PO 

$250 Saturn Ion with a bad alternator and a PO who had a hankering for a new car -- drove a couple years then sold for $2k when I got the fun car

And that's just without trying. I track the math, too, and there's no comparison whatsoever to buying new. 
 

Back to the OP though: I have no relevant opinion. I considered new for about 20 minutes before I did the math on my used cars' repairs

A new car will never compare to beater operational cost (when comparing similar vehicles).  

To me the main attraction to a new car is the following:

• You value your time and energy and do not wish to spend forever looking for a car in the used market.
• You can buy something that isn't available used, or is new enough that the value proposition of a used version isn't there.
• It can be a very small price to pay to not have to have something that 'just works'.  I suspect 90% of new car buyers choose a new car for this reason.

Right now New cars are piling up in dealers  inventory. They have to pay interest on those.  Thus they are typically back to discounting them.   
  Although if you don't understand the process, are impatient, you don't get a deep discount.   
   For newbies,  smaller cars offer them 10% less than MSRP  ( list price before dealer add  ons ) 

    Full size trucks, SUV's  etc offer 20% less than MSRP

         STAND YOUR GROUND!  Be prepared to leave  and take your business elsewhere.  
      The rough rule  of thumb is 3 times , getting up and leaving before they take you serious.  
     Figure 3 hours to buy the car.  Plus once you have a deal another hour for paperwork.    Yeh!!!  Pain in the posterior.  
  But on an $80,000 truck you are earning $16,000 in savings for those 3 hours.   The average $44,000 car figure your time worth $1500 an hour.   
    Pick the dealer carefully.   If the lot isn't full of new cars you might have a battle. 
  Plus premium cars like Corvette ZO6 or Supercharged Mustangs   Buying at MSRP is a deal!!! 

P3PPY said:

Haha Frenchy this is not the forum for saying "don't tell me about that cheap car you got that lasted a long time for little money". You're in the wrong woods for that to work. I have many such examples in mind without even trying:

$350 Neon that needed a power steering pressure sensor -- still on the road 12 years later

$500 Prelude that needed the custom headlights removed so it would stop popping fuses -- had it a couple years, saw it on the road over a year after selling

$200 Bronco 2 with a bad starter, NOT a bad trans, as the PO said -- gifted it to BIL and it was given up on because of a bad ground >:(

$FREE Sentra that needed a new strut to get driving -- had a couple years then donated while still running

$FREE Accord with a CEL and busy PO 

$250 Saturn Ion with a bad alternator and a PO who had a hankering for a new car -- drove a couple years then sold for $2k when I got the fun car

And that's just without trying. I track the math, too, and there's no comparison whatsoever to buying new. 
 

Back to the OP though: I have no relevant opinion. I considered new for about 20 minutes before I did the math on my used cars' repairs

I need that kind of luck!

I've had new cars before, mostly a combination of wanting a warranty, and the peace of mind of having something that shouldn't run into problems for a while.  I currently don't own anything I bought new, but then I am also no longer commuting.  My wife bought her current car new, but that was 7 years ago.

Performance cars are another issue for me.  I have bought two of them new, because I didn't want to risk buying  that had been beat to within an inch of it's like, but still looked good.  With the WRX, it was a major concern.  I prefer to buy new, or older and heavily depreciated.  Nice looking, low mileage performance cars scare me, perhaps more than they should.  
 

I will admit I am thinking of downsizing my collection, and buying a Mustang GT, but I probably won't, since it would not make a great road trip/camping vehicle.  However, I really prefer the looks of the 2023 model over the 2024, so my window to buy new is closing.

It's very interesting reading through these responses. 

There was one that stuck out, someone mentioned that buying that new car was how they entered into the housing market. That worked for you, and that's great, but it is so wildly beyond the truth it's crazy. I wonder how vehicle prices, crappy finance deals, etc. would change if people realized that a car loan is yes a way to build credit history, but not the only way. My wife and I were driving mid 90's cars when we bought our house 5 years ago in a HCOL area, spending way more than we expected for our first home, excellent credit from using CC's and paying off every month. 

To the point that I've seen a few times, around people saying "if you value your time", what's that about? I value my time, yes, and part of that time is doing something I am good at, which is diagnosing and wrenching on cars. There is great satisfaction in taking vehicle that is neglected and bringing it back to life, or making it your own. That is an okay thing to be spending your time on. For some, it may feel below them, and those are probably the people I don't want to hang out with at parties. To me, it is in some part therapy. It's ritualistic to go over the daily drivers and make sure they are in good condition and they will get my family home when needed. Trusting that some underpaid and overworked mechanic is going to do the same is ridiculous. If you think that bringing your FRS into Toyota means that a mechanic who cherishes or values that car beyond anything but another repair order, well... Then again, if they leave the drain plug out, Toyota would need to replace the mill, I guess how much is your time worth when waiting in the customer lounge? 

Besides, to some of the points above, this is GRM, not Rennlist, the argument that somehow a brand new car is absolutely without any faults, and cannot fail doesn't work here, and that a used car is somehow a ticking time bomb of cascading failures, is ridiculous. 

I think new cars work for some people, but the costs are staggering. If you are in a financial position to purchase brand new without any loans, then we probably aren't talking the same language. But if entering a loan agreement, you get a few years down the road, and don't love the car, how do you recover? You've taken a huge hit in depreciation, you are still financially liable for the remainder of the loan for a car that doesn't really resonate with you.

I'd actually be very interested to hear what someone who has purchased a brand new, enthusiast car, is shelling out for their monthly financial liability. 400? 500? 600? There was at least one person who did the math and worked out that buying new was cheaper than buying used, I would legitmiately love to see that, but I have never been able to make the math work! 

Everybody needs to do what works for them, but the thought of spending money on a depreciating asset and chalking the net negative cost to "well it's more reliable and I don't need to think about it" is wild to me. I spend more time thinking about what fun car I get to drive next or what new mountain bike widget or dirt bike widget or whatever widget I'm going to pursue next than worrying that my daily driver is going to catastrophically fail. And if something were to catastrophically fail in life (someone get's hurt, we lose our jobs, etc.), it's one less financial liability to think about. 

Believe it or not we don't feel it's "beneath us" to work on the daily. And if that's what you got from this you're right, we probably won't hang out at parties. 
 

what we HAVE said is that it feels like work after you've been doing it for 30 years. But doing it for 30 years allowed us to save and purchase new cars when the market was right. When we traded in the wife's Rio we got $500 less fornit than we paid for it 2.5 years before, with 45k less miles then. A used Seltos was $26k and not optioned the way we wanted, her new was 24.5k. My forte was a want purchase for sure. Turbo manual sedan with all the tech I enjoy, but it was the same new as a used with 15-20k miles and half the warranty. 
 

we also are under no illusions that a new car can't fail. What's nice tjough is if it does, someone else takes care of it and you get something else to drive while they fix it. 
 

you can call us snooty, stuck up or whatever makes you feel better. Believe me when I say I stopped giving a E36 M3 what people thought about me years ago. There are those I care about and everyone else, well your opinion is of no concern of mine. Just don't ask a question and then reject the answers because you don't like them. 
 

monthly liability for the two new cars? $87 per month insurance each and license plates every year. In 10 years we will be back to the state minimum on registration again. Our last new car purchase is still with us but the cancer is taking its toll after 17 salt filled winters. 
 

you do you but don't chastise us as we do us. 

In 2017 I decided I wanted an Alfa Romeo Giulia Quadrifoglio, and it was either new or nothing.

I rarely admit it, but the used 2017 Fiat 124 Spider I purchased at 1/4 the cost of there Giulia is actually more fun to drive.  The Giulia is more comfortable on a long drive though.

In reply to Steve :

I just noticed your location.  Working on a used car is very different in area where roads are salted in the winter.   Corrosion causes more problems earlier in the car's life, and makes working on them a lot more annoying.  Those first few years in the salt regions are a major part of their low effort maintenance life.
 

Addendum to my earlier post - one of my new purchases was a 2004 F150 Heritage.  It was cheaper than any late model pickup I could find used optioned the way I wanted.  V8, tow package, limited slip, extended cab, and cruise control.   No dealer near me had that combo on their used lot cheaper than I could buy new.  

In reply to eastsideTim :

My '13 Rio SX is the epitome of salt belt problems. Needed a wheel bearing, had to replace the knuckle, hub, axle, bearing and lower control arm because they were a rusty mess. On an 8 year old car with 80k miles. Rear beam and front subframe looks like they came off the titanic. Hell, I had corrosion on the KNOCK sensor, causing it to not pick up knock early enough causing detonation and eating a set of plugs and a coil. 

Even buying something from the south used is only good for 1-2 seasons before it starts to be the same way, or about the tie you need to start replacing things. The number of rotors I've had to cut off the hubs is way too many. 

I drove a succession of beaters from around 1992 through 2002.

Like many here I paid next to nothing for them and drove them for a few years. I even profited on a couple of them. They needed surprisingly little repairs. Lots of things on them were wrong (busted AC, switches that half worked etc.) but it never stopped them from running 

For the last 20 years I've purchased lightly used cars; a 2001 Protege  ES and a 2011 Outback. The price difference on these was several thousand below new.

My wife's current car is her one and only new car; it was only a few grand higher than used.

In reply to Steve :

Tom,  you have to combine operating costs with purchase price or you are fooling yourself.  
     The average car in America costs about $1900 a year for fuel costs.  (12000 miles divided by 22 MPG  X $3.50 / gallon.  Yes your gas per gallon can be more than that or your mileage less or more.  
      Then add the cost of an oil change.  ( remember to add your wages to the cost of oil and filter if you DIY )  that should include time to pick up the oil and filter plus properly dispose of same). 
     Figuring out how much to pay for repairs is harder.  Again to the cost of your parts required ( and time to get them )  add your wages. 
     Against that,  look at a New Chevy Bolt.  After the rebate you would have to divide the purchase price  by the 60 months. Add the sales tax, license and delivery cost.   That should be someplace around $350 a month with nothing down.  Since you can't drive 2 cars with the same butt  deduct the trade in or sale value of the car you have.  
   Since electricity is cheap. Figure you'll save about $150 a month over using gasoline.    So your net cost is $200 or so per month.  
     New car warranty  8 years 100,000 miles on the battery,  means no work!    Since a gas engine only has 50,000 mile's warranty but easily last many times that the battery should get you 20 years or so before it's shot.  
      The point is Tom. If you just need transportation and you figure real costs new can be cheaper than used or so close that the little difference is a decent trade off for the confidence  it gives you.  
     If like me you don't mind working on a car, you kind of enjoy it?   Then work on your race cars.  Your tow rig, whatever you'd prefer to do.

Not sure if it's already been said as I don't have time to read the entire thread. 

If no one buys new cars, there would eventually be no used cars. Also a common GRM trope:

"No manufacturers make sporty cars I want to buy."
"Do you buy new cars?"
"No, I refuse to buy new"
"Well  what do you expect."

Manufacturers don't care about sales on the used market, if there isn't a demand, IE people buy fun cars new, the manufacturers stop developing and making them. I've been putting my money where my mouth is on that front, new cars I've bought with manual transmissions new:

'10 Speed 3
'13 Mustang GT Track Pack
'15 BRZ
'23 BRZ

I'm going back through all the posts, but there is another point I don't recall seeing:

Financial stability, even though the cost of new might be more than used, the cost can be more consistent to budget for each month. 

If someone can't do their own work (skill, time, space, tools, etc), and has a limited slush fund, then new (or even lease) can be a safer financial option.

The warranty helps provide protection against a major failure and associated costs causing financial catastrophe. 

In reply to frenchyd :

My operating costs are way lower than that.

My beater cars all got 30mpg or higher. Regardless the cost of fuel is the same whether the cars are new or old.

For example: The 82 Honda Civic I bought for $600 never needed a single part in the 3 years I owned it. These cars are known to do 300K with little more than oil changes. I sold it for $1200.

I take it you didn't read the part where I made a profit on many of the cars.

In reply to Tom1200 :

Believe me we are jealous. There really isn't a 1982 anything left here. Desert life has its own challenges (rubber and plastics have a very short life) but that lack of rot is to die for!

and agreed on running costs. Our truck gets 20mpg but everything else is mid 30's. Our first accent cost aroubd 4 cents per mile with fuel, repairs, purchase, insurance. 

In reply to bobzilla :

Our beaters definitely have cracked dashes and rotting door seals but the shells do last foreved.

There is an up turned beetle in a sand wash I ride.......it moves about 100ft a decade. It still looks the same as it did when I rode past it in 1982.

I've been buying cars for 30 years. I was staunchly against new cars early on. Not only could I not afford them, but used cars at the time seemed to be about half price after 3-5 years. When I got to the point where I could afford a new car, I couldn't afford the ones I wanted new. The hot 3 year old car Vs. a new econo box? Not even a question. My math changed a bit as used cars started to hold their value longer. I may be wrong, but I think In the late 90's- early 2000's, the general public's opinion on the effects of mileage changed. People started realizing that their cars were lasting much longer and 50,000+ wasn't really high mileage. I also realized that I tended to keep my cars for a long time. Buying a used 5 year old car- I got 5 good years out of it. The next 5, the car would start showing it's age. Paint would fade, trim cracked, rubber bits would degrade. I realized that while I saved money overall, by enjoying the last 10 years of a 15 year old car, It wasn't equal to the first 10. Much of the "savings" from buying used I lost when it was time to sell. Add in the differences in interest rates, and it gets even closer. My first new vehicle was my '04 Nissan Titan. We had recently bought a house and my wife was due for a new vehicle. A crew cab truck seemed like a perfect do it all vehicle. Bought new because it was a new (rediscovered) vehicle segment back then. Still have the truck. Bought my only new for me with my money car the next year. Subaru came out with the Legacy GT wagon. Once I heard they would only offer the manual that year, went out and bought one. Next new car was a 2014 Toyota Sienna after kid #3. Paid less than similar used Sienna's went for at the time after a lot of shopping. She loved the Sienna, but had to get a new car at the end of 2019 for her work car program. Bought a Telluride because it was what she wanted. The Telluride got totaled at the end of last year. The insurance gave her more than she bought it for three years earlier, but the replacement cost was also much higher. The scarcity and high prices of new vehicles flipped the script again, and we bought a certified used Expedition for much less than new. 

I've been in 3 new vehicle purchases. 1996 ranger- it was michigan and I had looked at used but they were all junk from rust when you could find one used. 2021 mustang GT- looked for a 2018-down but they were as much as new or abused. Explorer st because there isn't anything available. Typically everything I buy is cheap cheap or newly used with 30-60k on it already. All my non project classics run and drive on sunny days only..