GOING to the supermarket can be terrifying these days - you just fill up with what you consider to be a normal shop – and then find you need to sell the kids to pay for it.
Everything seems to have doubled in price.
So it’s a pleasant surprise to find that your family car budget can stretch to a nice, shiny 4X4 for the kids to be chauffeured to school in.
Indeed, with average second hand car prices dropping you can get some pretty tasty metal for your money now.
At UsedCarExpert we have found several current generation Mercedes MLs at under £16,000 with less than 80,000 miles on the clock – all of them with 56/57 plates and in that rather nice metallic silver that Mercedes do so well.
Compare that to a lowly 2008 Nissan X-Trail for roughly the same money and you can see the appeal of the big Merc.
As ever though, it’s not that simple. The mileage of the Nissan is much, much lower and there is a reason why big, expensive cars such as the ML, or the BMW X5 and can lose so much value so fast.
That reason is the potentially wallet-crippling cost of running them. You may be able to buy them, but can you run them?
Consider the comparison below…
Mercedes ML 320
We found a 2006, current shape 320CDi with 80,000 miles on the clock and a full service history for just £16,000.
A bargain until you consider a new set of tyres is £1,200, or a new gear selector is £700 - and according to the UsedCarExpert.co.uk fault guide, that is a common problem.
Buy a newer car and you’ll have to fork out £1,200 for a fourth year service. Even a set of brake pads is £150 before fitting. Repairing the common fault with the injectors on this engine can cost upwards of £1,000.
BMW X5
An impressive car with real presence, a superb cabin and great accommodation.
You can pick up an early version of the current car for around £16,500 but the mileage will be a very high 100,000.
And, like the Mercedes, which is also built in the US, the cost of parts is very high. A big service will cost £1,000-plus and brake pads for this big SUV come in at £160.
Nissan X-Trail
There are plenty of very reasonably priced, low mileage X-Trails.
We found a nice 2008 car with an automatic gearbox, a full service history and less then 40,000 miles on the clock for £15,550.
Nissans are usually reliable and the X-Trail is no exception and with miles that low, you are unlikely to have any trouble.
Consider that a full set of pads is only £65, a new gearstick is £90 and the tyres are £100 each. Your four-year service will be £500, tops.
After all that if you are still tempted by the premium badge, look at it this way.
Let’s say you buy an ML and you find it needs four new tyres, a new gear selector, a big service, the gearbox is a bit hesitant, the engine a little noisy and the CD player is on the fritz.
Putting that lot right could cost you £10,000 - and that's more than you need to buy a nice, five year old X-Trail.