Good family car for £10,000 | Vauxhall Zafira News & FAQs

We really need your help! We are looking for a new car but the depreciation on most of the cars we can afford is making us think that a three year old model makes more sense. This way we can consider cars we can’t afford new, we need it to be less than £10,000 and have no more than 30k on the clock. We intend to get some quality mechanical insurance and run the car for 2 years up to 60k when most warranties can become iffy. We need a family vehicle that’s great on fuel.

Best regards,

Phil and Zoe Manley

Firstly, I have to congratulate you on the good sense of your argument. Depreciation is more often than not the biggest cost in car ownership and, without doubt, it makes good financial sense to have someone else shoulder the bulk of it. Buying a car at 3 years, when the manufacturer’s warranty has run out and the first MOT is present will often get you a bargain. It also makes sense to go for a warranty as well – we’d certainly recommend you go to warrantyexpert.co.uk for this. As to cars well we’d suggest a quick browse of these two sections of the website…

And…

We’d suggest having a look at the Ford Mondeo estate. It’s a remarkably good car which is very good in all respects and a nice spec, low mileage version of the previous model can be yours well within budget. You really cannot go wrong with the Mondeo but also check out the Vauxhall Zafira – a mid-sized MPV that is the best built vehicle in its class. It’s also worth taking a look at the Skoda Octavia, in both hatchback and estate format. You can easily get a diesel version of the current car for well within budget with less than 30k on the clock. Have a look at this…

You might also want to consider a couple of other things. With the budget you have it might make more sense to get a car that’s within warranty. You can easily afford a Zafira or Octavia that’s around 2 years old and this will give you added peace of mind. The other thing to do is consider buying a petrol car. Although the MPG won’t be quite so good, the much lower purchase price should offset this substantially and enable you to get a much newer car if you wish. Also the petrol engine is likely to be far more robust and much cheaper to service. Consider that for £9000 you can get this Zafira as a petrol…

http://www.usedcarexpert.co.uk/buy/vauxhall/zafira/d-44211/id-1761770/

But, for the same money as a diesel…

You see that the car is much older and the mileage much higher. Often a petrol car can be cheaper overall as the purchase price is so much lower.

I hope all this helps and good luck with your search,

Best wishes,

Tom