New (ish) car buying mileage...

[paulbadassbriant]

I'm looking to purchase a Red Citigo Monte Carlo after i've passed my driving test, the question is what kind of mileage is favourable? I've spoken to people at work and they say don't go higher than 20,000 miles on a fairly new car, others say the lower the better, they're obviously more expensive though...

 

So do i spend £4995 for a 64 plate with 24,100 miles? 

or do i spend £6500 for a £64 plate with 13,655 miles?

or do i spend £7000 for a 64 plate with 2080 miles?

or do i spend £7299 for a 65 plate with 3692 miles?

 

These are just prices from currently available cars on Autotrader...

 

There's no real budget just means i've got longer to pay my dad back 

 

and the more i spend the less i have to mould the car to my liking with accessories and mods... :p

[davidwhite]

I'd check out the 24k, if it's 1 owner ( poss + dealer ) for me it would need FSH and some form of warranty, maybe it's still covered by Skoda, any faults should have been ironed out by now. Hopefully it's from a dealer, if no px I'd be looking for at least 5% off price I'd go in at 4495 and walk away to prove I was firm, you can always go back or wait for a phone call ! Compare price and mileage on like for like cars hopefully you will have some bargaining power.

A car is a big outlay, if it's your 1st cheaper is best as you will certainly hanker for something ' better ' once the novelty has worn off, plus the quicker you have paid for it the sooner you can move into something a tad better ( not that you have made a bad choice by any stretch of the imagination)

[paulbadassbriant]

I'd check out the 24k, if it's 1 owner ( poss + dealer ) for me it would need FSH and some form of warranty, maybe it's still covered by Skoda, any faults should have been ironed out by now. Hopefully it's from a dealer, if no px I'd be looking for at least 5% off price I'd go in at 4495 and walk away to prove I was firm, you can always go back or wait for a phone call ! Compare price and mileage on like for like cars hopefully you will have some bargaining power.

A car is a big outlay, if it's your 1st cheaper is best as you will certainly hanker for something ' better ' once the novelty has worn off, plus the quicker you have paid for it the sooner you can move into something a tad better ( not that you have made a bad choice by any stretch of the imagination)

64 REG + 1 F/KEEPER + SERVICE PLAN + SKODA WARRANTY 2017 + SAT NAV + FSH + LOOKS & DRIVES SUPERB + VERY ECONOMICAL + CHEAP INSURANCE + MONTE CARLO + GENUINE EXAMPLE, Full dealership history,

 

thanks for the advice, unfortunately i'm not buying a car till January, but i'll be sure to check back here when i need some buying advice

[VRS Mike]

I'd buy the 64 plate with 21k

[paulbadassbriant]

I'd buy the 64 plate with 21k

so the general consensus is that 20,000 miles on a two year old car is ok....

[Gizmo]

Average mileage is 12K per year, so they are all fine, they are all still under Škoda manufacturers warranty so providing they have a full service history (2 services on the 24K car) buy the best conditioned car / best spec.

 

In your situation I would buy the cheapest.

[paulbadassbriant]

Average mileage is 12K per year, so they are all fine, they are all still under Škoda manufacturers warranty so providing they have a full service history (2 services on the 24K car) buy the best conditioned car / best spec.

 

In your situation I would buy the cheapest.

 

thanks for all the advice....

[YetiVRS]

Very low mileage isn't always good, a low mileage car might of been driven a mile a day by an old lady and never had its engine get warm.

In that case it would be more worn than a high mileage car that had done all long runs

[listensqueak]

Yes, my car 15 plate with 21k miles... all up and down the M40. Nothing has gone wrong and the tyres are still better than 50% by the look of it. A car with 2k has likely just been to the paper shop once a day and never got fully warmed through. I too would go for the 24k one. Big savings to be had and it will be run in for you. 

[leckman]

The Citigo is a city car and has been designed with this fact in mind a short journey to the paper shop/supermarket will have its engine warmed through thanks to its design.

[Gizmo]

The Citigo is a city car and has been designed with this fact in mind a short journey to the paper shop/supermarket will have its engine warmed through thanks to its design.

 

Even Škoda cannot change the laws of physics, an engine that never gets its oil up to full working temperature (which will take longer than a couple of miles) is going to have a shorter life than one that does ‘normal’ mileage.

 

For this reason I would never buy an ultra low mileage car unless I knew it’s history (the MIL rarely uses the car but when she does it is always 5+ miles, usually 50+ miles, the rest of the time the car is sat in the garage)

[smargh]

It has been well over a year since I went out in my (former) Citigo when it was below 0C ambient, but I think I recall it reaching the usual 90C operating temperature after about 10-15 minutes, including 1min to get it out of the garage, which was around three quarters of a 6-mile journey to work in mostly moving traffic. However, I always kept the RPM under around 2500, which probably didn't help.

 

The only time I think it was only able to reach around 80C on the journey to work was on particularly cold mornings, say -7C. It *might* have only done this when I had the cabin blower on max, which seemed to (and I might be completley wrong!) result in the engine taking a longer time to heat up, which kinda sorta would make sense.

 

In winter, a lot of people south of Scotland would often have an ambient temperature above zero on their afternoon return work journey, so at least that journey would be a lot more likely to reach operating temp.

Edited 23 October, 2016 by smargh

[Chris GB]

My last Citigo was running sweetly at over 100,000 miles, with the interior holding up well enough, so don't be overly concerned with mileage.

As for getting the engine warm, water temperature comes up fast, but oil temperature is a different thing altogether. Most road cars won't see f full oil temperature until 20 miles has been driven at reasonable speeds. A car that's only been used for short journeys will have more water, acids and unburnt fuel in its oil, so less desirable than something used for longer journeys.

[mannyo]

The engine oil takes significantly longer to get up to temperature than the coolant, so whilst the temperature gauge gets to 90c relatively quickly the oil temperature is still well down at that point. I had an old Audi that had both oil and water temp gauges and the oil really struggled to temperature at town speeds, but once on the motorway it rose quickly.

[Updown789]

After installing an oil temp gauge to daves citigo, I can attest to the fact that the coolant temp reaches 90 degrees a whole lot faster than the oil does. In fact the oil was less than 40 degrees for a good couple of miles after the coolant was up to temperature.

[ronime]

^ This. It's the same story with our Leon 1.8TSi which has water and oil temperature readouts in the MFD.

Sure, it is a larger engine than the Citigo with more metail, oil and water to heat up but it also generates three times as much power (and heat) as a 60PS Citigo.

Edited 24 October, 2016 by ronime

[FlyingGecko]

Even Škoda cannot change the laws of physics, an engine that never gets its oil up to full working temperature (which will take longer than a couple of miles) is going to have a shorter life than one that does ‘normal’ mileage.

 

For this reason I would never buy an ultra low mileage car unless I knew it’s history (the MIL rarely uses the car but when she does it is always 5+ miles, usually 50+ miles, the rest of the time the car is sat in the garage)

 

 

Ditto both sentences.

History is paramount. My OH has a 2012 Up, got it a year ago with 20k and FSH, but she's only doing around 1500 miles a year. She uses it for pottering a couple of times a week, but every fortnight or less I'll take it out for a 40/50 mile thrash. Her previous Pug 206 (owned from 2001) had the same treatment over the past few years, but was still reliable as anything (also due to the annual servicing and repairs regardless of cost) when we moved it out of the family at 88k and 16 years old. It's since done five 600 mile round trips to Glasgow in the past four months without missing a beat.