Forget fuel, road tax or insurance, the biggest cost of running a car is depreciation, otherwise known as the difference between the on-the-road price you pay to buy the car when new and the figure you can recoup when selling it to its next owner.
That second-hand price is also known as the car’s residual value, and if you’re not careful it can be a real sting in the tail of any new or used car deal. Here we’re looking at the fastest depreciating cars on the market, both in terms of percentage retained value and total value lost.
To help you avoid mobile money-pits, we’ve combed the latest new car depreciation data to create a list of possible new car purchases with the biggest sting in the tail – the UK’s fastest depreciating cars.
Our list, compiled with expert UK market analysis data, covers cars that you can buy new today and looks at what they will be worth after three years and 36,000 miles of use. These are the disastrous depreciators that experts say you shouldn’t touch with a bargepole, if you want to hang on to your cash. Of course, look at it another way and these cars could be opportunities for the canny used buyer to pick-up a three-year old bargain.
