My Octavia wagon is nearing 3yr old. Only ever owned one car over 3yr and out of warranty, I'd been looking for alternatives that would suit my lifestyle. To cut a long story short, before lockdown, I hadn't found any car that can compete with my Octavia. ( Incredibly a Karoq had been one of the better options back then ). A wee bit of DIY would make a few others suitable, but even spending lots more money on a car, I couldn't find anything to match let alone better my Octavia wagon.

 

One manufacture I had ignored was Audi but my eye caught something sitting on the local forecourt on Friday - an A6 Avant which to these eyes looked very sleek. At first glance I thought what's a Panamera Tourismo doing at an Audi dealership? Even sitting beside similar Avants, this one seemed to have extra presence. So I came home and done a little investigating - it was the latest Black Edition and equipped with what Audi call a Technology pack ( which is basically a digital dash ). Apart from that it's the std car. The list price is an unbelievable £50k, but can be purchased new from a broker for £39k. ( Thats still a tremendous amount of money IMO). This car however was 5mth old and had 1200 miles on the clock, £33800. No brainer then, especially if the dealer was willing to negotiate on that price whenever they open. OK it's got me interested - few things are better built than an Audi afterall. ( I had one 20 years ago and it was both beautifully engineered and built ).

 

 

So I look at the equipment list and yes it's pretty well equipped, as it should be at £50k. Adaptive cruise? Err no, just bog std. Auto Dipping door mirrors? Err no, just ordinary glass. Self parking then? Err no, just all round sensors with a camera. Blind spot monitor? Err no. So there's four things I'd have to give up straight away. Then I notice the once button heavy A6 centre console has been replaced by a touch screen which sits low down. Well apart from the awkwardness of trying to read / operate it whilst driving, we all know from our Columbus and Bolero systems just how filthy a touchscreen can look with finger prints. Might look futuristic but didn't impress me. What I couldn't see tho was how practical the load bay was so went to the Audi forum.

 

 I get to A6 and first thread I notice is someone complaining about dashboard rattles and then read that it's common place with the new A6 model. This thing is £50,000 remember, my Octavia hasn't suffered any rattle. Can't see what I'm looking for so I ask a question and back come some very informative replies with pics. So what lurks under the highest level boot floor position? the spare wheel. The Audi has no sneaky hidden storage spaces, you'd struggle to fit a Mars bar under that floor.

This is what lurks under the boot floor of my Octavia: Amongst other things I have wetsuits, a small tent, portable stove, Kayak paddles, life jackets etc. And underneath that lot? The spare wheel.

 

 

I haven't seen any estate that doesn't offer at least some other hidden storage area. ( An E-class is vast but due to design isn't as practical for my needs over an Octavia ). Potentially a Passat is larger but due to a diffent variable boot mechanism, would need some DIY to bring it to Skodas standard. 5 Series and Volvos offer space but these are compartments so you're limited on the size of items you can carry underfloor. A 5 seat Kodiaq would be brilliant, even a Karoq with adjustable boot floor would fit the bill ( although Skoda no longer appear to offer this as an option ). For heavens sake, even a Renault Captur shows others the way when it comes to boot design. But an A6 Avant? Absolutely bloody useless. A few sheets of A4 paper perhaps but that's it.

 

The story gets worse because even if I didn't wish to compromise on the spec of my Octavia, I could buy a brand new A6 Avant and spec it accordingly right? Wrong. Get this...  Audi do not offer self parking even as an option. Heated windscreen? Audi don't offer it. Tri-zone climate? Audi don't offer it.   Err,  so what about USB ports in rear? Audi don't offer those either      Ok, rear cup holders, it must have cup holders, this is supposed to be a £50k executive car after all. The good news is you can have rear cup holders - if you specify the storage Pack at £100. The bad news is most of the demo / nearly new cars I saw at the garage didn't have this option, and if you check the Audi website, very few used A6's have this option selected.  So no rear cup holders! Bloody hell. Heated rear seats? You must be joking!  What about a heated steering wheel... it's an executive car, even a Skoda Scala can be bought with a heated steering wheel. Noooo!  Audi don't even offer a heated steering wheel as an option. Can you believe that?

 

Before I'd looked into the equipment I'd checked insurance quotes. I didn't spend much time I just used one broker (compare the market) simply for comparison purposes. I used my Octavia to set the benchmark, the quote came back at £308. ( I paid £260 in Feb gone using another broker ).

 

So £308 for a 1.4tsi manual Octavia. An A6 40tdi (2.0L) Black Edition DSG? £604. That's double the price. Seems expensive so I get further quotes on similar cars I'd been looking at a few months back for comparison:

 

BMW 520d Msport auto Touring £450

BMW 520i Msport auto Touring £421

Merc E220d AMG Premium Line auto £413

Superb 1.5T Sportline DSG £323   ( which is roughly the same quote for my Octavia manual )

 

and just for fun

Kodiaq 1.5 DSG Edition £344

Karoq 1.5 DSG Edition £337    ( funny how Karoq / Kodiaq / Superb autos all roughly same as my Octavia manual despite them costing 25k - £30k whilst my car worth around £13k.

 

So even the insurance industry see the A6 as a liability. Jeez, does the car have anything going for it?

 

"All fur coat and no knickers" would probably be the kindest thing I could say about the A6 Avant. To these eyes the Black edition I saw was a beautiful looking machine, it could easily pass as a Porsche, but honestly, a Kamiq is better designed, more practical and potentially offers more 'executive' levels of equipment.

 

Marketed as an executive estate, if there's a car less fit for purpose car on sale than the A6 Avant I've yet to see it. Lets hope none of those executives sitting in the rear want to put down their Costa Coffee or charge their smartphone. And if they want to warm their bum on the £1000 optional leather seats, ask them to fart.    

Edited 17 May, 20206 yr by Guest

My Brother had a lot of nice company cars until he retired last year and from 2015 until 2019 he did 110,000 miles in a 2.0TDi A6 S-Line saloon. However when he gave the Audi back the car he bought for himself with his own money was a new Kia Sorrento with a 7 year warranty because it was as he said fully loaded as standard and similar money to his 2015 Audi A6.

Neighbour had the Allroad version and found the MPG shockingly bad and his company questioned whether he was siphoning fuel.  

 

It was in the 30s mpg which for a not huge engined diesel was shocking.

 

Was glad to see the back of it.

We all know that the Octavia takes some beating when it comes to space, practicality,  quality and value. I particularly love the climate control. I can’t think of another car I’d really like except another Octavia. And there is nothing wrong with mine. The price of options on the new Mk8 Golf can be eye watering. 

i always only had an RS4 or RS6 on my "audis worth the premium" list. 

but the above is a shocking list of bs for a car pitching itself against bmw, merc and lexus...

There can be bargains used Audis.

 

But then you can get bargains in a new or used 1.4 TSI manual Octavia. (No longer made & now a Hybrid 1.4TSI)

Not sure why anyone would compare an end of line manual with a list of autos & DSG's though.

 

 

 

 

A4 Avant if you do not need to drive a barge like a Superb or an A6.

 

 

Edited 18 May, 20206 yr by Roottootemblowinootsoot

I looked at an allroad before I got the bmw.

 

It looked very overpriced and underspecced in comparison to pretty much everything. Dealer was actually apologetic, and agreed the car wasnt good value but that was what he had to price it at.

Think it was (then) £19k for a poverty spec A4 allroad 2.0 tdi, that was due timing belt (not included), and had flat tyres.

 

3 series is much better value in that segment.

 

Insurance probably relates to high cost of parts and servicing at Audi

Edited 20 May, 20206 yr by Aspman