How much do you drive?
How many miles do you cover on average in a week, a month or a year?
You’ve probably never given a great deal of thought towards the answers to these questions before – it is not really a deciding factor for the average person when it comes to getting yourself a vehicle, but maybe it is something you should step back and consider. Whether you are someone who covers a great deal of miles every year or someone who only uses their car for the five minute trip into town, it should have some impact upon the vehicle you choose.
I was speaking to a colleague of mine at work only a couple of weeks ago and asking him about how often he drives his used Ferrari F355. He said that he drives it two and a half miles to work and back each day and rarely uses it for any long distances. Although I didn’t express my true feelings at the time about this, it really is ludicrous to me. Why would you own a car that guzzles fuel like there’s no tomorrow just to travel a couple of miles a day to work and back?
There are so many vehicles which would make far more sense to drive. I used to own an Audi A5 around five years ago, which was great because it’s an excellent cruiser and I was doing a minimum of 70 miles a day (sometimes much more when I had to go to different cities), but as soon as I received a job offer near my home I put it up for sale online. I knew I wouldn’t be doing nearly as much driving and there seemed literally no point in owning a vehicle which wasn’t particularly economical and certainly wasn’t built for city driving. Don’t get me wrong the A5 is not too bad at all on fuel when you are doing fifty or sixty miles an hour down a dual carriageway for the majority of the day, but it would cost a fortune to run doing a couple of miles here and a couple of miles there.
Consequently I had a look around and ended up getting myself a used Fiat Panda. It is a city car which does everything I need it to and is undeniably cheap to run, even if I am starting my engine five or six times a day. I’d be lying if I said that I didn’t miss driving the A5, but for me there was no question – I couldn’t justify the expenses associated with it.
However I am now looking at getting a larger vehicle for myself again, namely a used Lexus CT. This isn’t because I’ve started covering more miles again, but because the Lexus CT is a hybrid which means it runs via a petrol engine as well as an electric motor. As a result it boasts superb fuel economy, even better than most city vehicles. It does cost over £20,000 to buy new so I’ve been looking at contract hire Lexus CT 200h deals.