Used Volvo V70's.....Why are they now selling for peanuts?

[ddahaa]

A lot of it depends on if you paid the right price when you bought your car.
You say that you spent £7500 in 2005 on your V70 but which model is it and was it low mileage? Did you pay too much to start with? You will always pay a premium for lower miles. I wasn't looking at Volvo prices back then so can't comment too much.

As a general rule, the larger or more expensive a car is when it is new, the faster it will depreciate. Obviously the scrappage scheme and the credit crunch/recession has had a lot to play too.
Cars under 60k miles also tend to command higher prices, once the 60k barrier is broken the prices come down quicker. So if you bought under 60k and are selling over 60k you tend to lose out more.

Real world examples, in 2002 I bought an 1996 850 Estate T5 auto and only paid £3000 for it, but it had done almost 200k miles as a company car. The car was great and could return a genuine 42mpg on the motorway. I eventually sold it for around £2500

I don't think V70's have suffered depreciation any worse than a similar sized car, you just have to buy at the right price to start with. There are some good bargains out there, but anyone paying £1500ish for your car with its mileage and history would be happy, so why sell it? Not much you can do about depreciation except buy cheap to minimise it, or look at the bargains you can get once someone else has taken the big hit.

As for servicing, main dealers of any make are always more expensive. A basic oil change on my old BMW diesel cost £176 at the main dealers and over £70 of that was oil! A good garage should charge the same labour rate no matter what the car, but some might try to charge more if they think the owner could afford it/will pay up!

[cornerwaysuk]

I also have a Volvo V70 Classic 2000 on a W Plate. I bought it August 2007 for £2500. It is not a gas guzzler far from it as it has an LPG conversion. It drives superb, has great comfort, has been totally reliable. Carries everything i want it to. The LPG was fitted to the car 6 months from new and i have to say i wanted a large car with LPG and this volvo fitted the bill perfectly. I dont want to sell it and would only consider selling it to upgrade to a new shape but it would have to be LPG converted. I have done 35000 miles in the car and its been a pleasure to own and drive.
The depreciation is only a matter when i get rid of the car so its still worth the same as when i bought it to me, in reality i dont think it is worth much less regardless.
Cheers by the way i am looking for some cheep alloys with good tyres for it preferably 16 inch anyone got any they dont want????:notworth y:

[Chris Parish]

I have an S60 2.0 S T which will be selling for peanuts soon. It is a 2001 model with 190K on the clock. I bought it five years ago (at 144K miles) for £4750. The only cost during that time apart from servicing was a new battery and four new tyres. That means that I have been able to drive a very nice car for the last five years at a depreciation of £750 per year (assuming I sell it for £1K). That takes a lot of beating. The timing belt now needs changing, it surges a bit but it has been doing that for the last year (probably the TCM) and now the clutch is on its way out. It has just passed its MOT, like it has for the last four years with no problem.

I see Volvos as being a good car for my requirements at my end of the market. I am one of the people who benefit from the "peanuts" pricing!

[charlotte001]

Originally Posted by sierraman

Hi
I have a W reg 2000 V70 Classic that cost me £7500.00 in December 2005. At the time a similar plated Mondeo could be had for £3,000 to £3,500 and the only Volvo's for that sort of money were old 850's and low spec v40's.

My V70 has 91,000 on the clock and fsh and now appears to be worth something between £1,000-£1,750 judging by autotrader and ebay sales (max £2,250 if you are lucky and prepared to wait all year to sell) I was recently offered £1,100 from a company that advertises on tv. We buy any car.com

So what has happened to the re-sale values of used volvo v70's? These cars are supposed to be high end and are often classed as "Executive cars". They certainly cost an "executive amount of money" to maintain and to be fair look higher class/higher quality than the average mondeo or similar.

I went onto the autotrader site the other night and to my amazement i found similar mileage mondeo's are worth the same amount of money that my car is worth now. Mark 3 mondeo's are selling for similar money and so are the mark 4's. Adding to this they were roughly the same age as my car (some newer)and therefore on average they have lost 50% of their value since December 2005

My Volvo appears to have lost over 75% of its re-sale value in less than 4 years of costly ownership. Why? Have the etm problems killed their re-sale value or is it the reliabilty issues and the over priced parts and labour on these cars? Who knows? I live in Birmingham and trying to get independent garages that know how to repair and work on Volvo's is a nightmare. Is this the problem?

Judging by the resale value of my car now. I could have bought 2 mondeo's at the time of purchase and both of them (individually) would be worth similar money to my v70 now!!!

So why buy a Volvo v70? Has Ford ownership ruined the brand? What has gone wrong and why is my car worth peanuts now?

My car is only worth Mondeo money now and i feel robbed!

A simple answer to this one

No one wants a car which doesnt do 35+mpg anymore they all seem to want little japanese boxes which all look the same do 136g/k of CO2 and can do upwards of 50mpg. Wish my DB9 would do 50mpg or 136g of CO2 at least my 850 has far better fuel economy [you gotta love that sport button or the V12]

[rippedoffagain]

Originally Posted by charlotte001

A simple answer to this one

No one wants a car which doesnt do 35+mpg anymore they all seem to want little japanese boxes which all look the same do 136g/k of CO2 and can do upwards of 50mpg.

True. But people fail to realise that fuel economy isn't everything. I fell for that old chestnut once. I had a perfectly good Cavalier for 3 years that hardly cost me anything in maintenance. It did about 35mpg on a good run. I decided I wanted a more fuel efficient car so I got rid of the Cav and got a diesel Vectra. It saved me a fortune in fuel, giving me 50+mpg on a good run, and about 40mpg round town. BUT, it kept busting. In less than a year of owning it all sorts needed doing. I'd get one thing fixed and something else would fail. In March I sold it to my mate for £50, just because I'd had enough. I got my 940, which means back to being a bit heavy on the juice, but in terms of maintenance its cost me next to nothing. Not counting tyres (because we can't blame a car for tyres wearing can we), I've spent less than £100 on bits for it so far.

Someone commented that old cars go wrong. True, but so do newer cars. When I was telling my neighbour that I'd got rid of my Vectra and got the 940 because my Vectra had dropped to bits, his attitude was 'yeah well, once cars start getting towards 10 year old they've had it'. I point out that my 'new' car was much older, at 16 years old, to which he quite casually, almost dismissively replied, 'yeah but its Volvo. Volvo's a bit different'.

[Jhughes]

I'm just very grateful that they do sell for peanuts as it means I can afford to buy them!

I bought the 240 for £1000 and put 70K on it before flogging it for £200.
I bought the 940 for £1900 (with 88k on it) and sold it for £500 112K later
I bought the 850 for £3000 with 100K on and it is still going strong and looking good

In a couple of years time I just hope there will be a nice well-spec'd 2006 V70 for around £3K for me to carry on the tradition!

[BarryK]

In other industries it is called asset stripping. Ford has taken many of the V70 attributes and applied them to the Mondeo, at the same time Volvos have been bestowed with cheap plastic parts and had the Ford spare parts pricing structure applied. The difference is that there are more garages and spares outlets for Ford than Volvo and the Mondeo is designed to throw away at the 100k mark. My local Volvo dealer is also a Ford and Mazda dealer so the predatory salesmen regard Volvo owners as a good catch to the point that I will no longer go there. Fortunately there are a few good suppliers of mail order parts and some specialist repair centres around. I value Volvos for what they are, and have always been, tremendously good quality and value for money. As it will take a few more years for my current cars to reach 200K miles I am in no hurry to find replacements. The writers assessment is correct and to the point, one V70 is worth 2 Mondeos.

[oldyoungman]

I came into this conversation late.
But, the other day, I did a good motorway run, racked up almost 400miles in total and used between 40-50litres(I think more than likely 40, but not sure) which equates to 44-35mpg, which, I think isn't too bad, considering for part of the journey, I was in slow/stop/start city centre trafiic, ragged it a bit on the way up, but cruised along at 60ish(On the motorway) on the way back.
And, if my comfortable, safe, reliable, nice looking car, can achieve a respectable mpg measurement, then I'm a happy man, and highly recommend getting a Volvo, and am considering getting another one, in addition to wanting a C30.
Yeah, sorry for long post, I wanted my voice heard.
Tom.