Why are cars in the UK so expensive?
Discussion
I've been looking at what you guys pay for cars over there and I can't believe how much more they cost.
Is it all VAT?
My Wife's Mini S with all the toys was $25,000 USD. My Lotus Elise was $49,000 with the Extige suspension and leather interior. A new Corvette sells for $45,000.
In Florida, we pay 8% sales tax, but you only pay tax on the difference between the value of what you trade in and the price of the new car. If you trade in a car worth $35,000 on a new $45,000 car, you only pay 8% of the $10,000 difference. Some states don't have any sales tax at all. It cost me $35 per car each year to register it.
Is the mark-up the same for all cars? Are imported cars taxed more than just VAT?
Can you import the car yourself and just pay the VAT? I'm trying to figure out why you have to pay almost twice what we do for a Corvette.
Why are you guys getting screwed?
>> Edited by Joecooool on Wednesday 22 June 06:50
Is it all VAT?
My Wife's Mini S with all the toys was $25,000 USD. My Lotus Elise was $49,000 with the Extige suspension and leather interior. A new Corvette sells for $45,000.
In Florida, we pay 8% sales tax, but you only pay tax on the difference between the value of what you trade in and the price of the new car. If you trade in a car worth $35,000 on a new $45,000 car, you only pay 8% of the $10,000 difference. Some states don't have any sales tax at all. It cost me $35 per car each year to register it.
Is the mark-up the same for all cars? Are imported cars taxed more than just VAT?
Can you import the car yourself and just pay the VAT? I'm trying to figure out why you have to pay almost twice what we do for a Corvette.
Why are you guys getting screwed?
>> Edited by Joecooool on Wednesday 22 June 06:50
Yes, we are getting screwed, but you should look at the price of cars in smaller EU nations before saying the UK is off the wall, Ireland and Finland make us look cheap!
PS When are you going to realise what a great deal you get on gas even with recent price hikes - fuel here is more than £4 per imperial gallon, that's more than $7!!!
PS When are you going to realise what a great deal you get on gas even with recent price hikes - fuel here is more than £4 per imperial gallon, that's more than $7!!!
CiderwithCerbie said:
Yes, we are getting screwed, but you should look at the price of cars in smaller EU nations before saying the UK is off the wall, Ireland and Finland make us look cheap!
PS When are you going to realise what a great deal you get on gas even with recent price hikes - fuel here is more than £4 per imperial gallon, that's more than $7!!!
And don't even dream of the prices in Scandinavia. Years back, I was in Denmark on a Harley rally. My bike had just cost me £7000 new, (told you it was a while ago
), we worked out that it would have cost me over £25,000 in Denmark, at the time.What about prices in Malaysia/Singapore? In Malaysia a Ferrari 360 will cost you about £300k, and you have to factor in the fact that your average Malaysian earns a fifth of your average Brit.
Cars in England are NOT expensive by world standards - only when compared to some of continental Europe and the US.
Cars in England are NOT expensive by world standards - only when compared to some of continental Europe and the US.
We are screwed because we have a goverment who belives they can spend (waste ) our money better than we can. They also listen to every pressure group with an axe to grind over car ownership and are trying to create a culture where car use and god forbide multiple ownership is a spawn of the devil. We have become accustomed to paying throygh the nose for every car we have. We pay high fuel duty, high road tax, there is a tax on our insurance premiums, every time we have any work done on the cars we own we pay 17.5% value added tax, new car tax, new car egistration fee. The car has become a cash cow to the British goverment and will continue to be so, the only differance is there will be fewer cars who will pay more. to sum up, we have a prime minister who hates cars, you had a president who still had his mustang from high school, that is why we are screwed.
I think the car manufacturers and dealerships are also guilty of a little greed.
Not only that, most manufacturers now demand that their dealerships have big glass-and-chrome showrooms. These certainly aren't cheap, and they have to recoup the cost somehow.
Car prices have been coming down, but they just put the cost onto parts, labour and whatnot instead.
Rip-off Britain. Treasure Island. Call it whatever you like, it's never going to change.
Not only that, most manufacturers now demand that their dealerships have big glass-and-chrome showrooms. These certainly aren't cheap, and they have to recoup the cost somehow.
Car prices have been coming down, but they just put the cost onto parts, labour and whatnot instead.
Rip-off Britain. Treasure Island. Call it whatever you like, it's never going to change.
CiderwithCerbie said:
PS When are you going to realise what a great deal you get on gas even with recent price hikes - fuel here is more than £4 per imperial gallon, that's more than $7!!!
I always laugh when my friends complain about high gas prices... around here it's $2 per gallon regular, $2.20 premium... Granted, I earn more than my friends, but really gas isn't too large of a cost. I've even upgraded to premium, which apparently is a faux pas for anyone under the age of 40...
But don't worry, I'm sure our prices for cars will increase as the government pays more and more attention to the groups lobbying for banning "Motor Vehicles of Death".
Marki said:
Try looking at car prices in Denmark you will find it is about UK prices +180% car tax
Try buying a car in Denmark!
The dealerships there squeeze the basic prices as low as they can (due to the sliding scale tax). Therefore its one of the best places to buy a new car, ship it back to the UK and opt to pay 17.5% VAT instead.
CiderwithCerbie said:
When are you going to realise what a great deal you get on gas even with recent price hikes - fuel here is more than £4 per imperial gallon, that's more than $7!!!
The reason they pay so much for a car is so it makes the price of gas seem cheap
. You might feel we have a great deal on gas and you people do pay a lot more for it which is unfortunate, but we are not used large spikes in price on anything. People in the UK and other parts of the world are conditioned to paying high prices and taxes throughout the years.
When I first bought my Ford Escort 10 years ago gas was under a dollar/gal, now it is over double the price. So what used to be $10 per tank it now takes over $20. A question for you people, did your gas price double in the last 10 years?
Think yourself lucky you don't live in Malta....
On average cars are 60% dearer than in the UK..
Examples, C180 Mercedes around £32,000 UK stg.
Basic Fiat Punto around £9500 UK stg.
And the average Maltese take home pay is around £130pw.
Plus you have a job going over 40mph on the terrible Maltese roads, and they are even introducing hidden speed cameras set at 27mph.....
Still see plenty of exotica though, Ferraris and the like.........
On average cars are 60% dearer than in the UK..
Examples, C180 Mercedes around £32,000 UK stg.
Basic Fiat Punto around £9500 UK stg.
And the average Maltese take home pay is around £130pw.
Plus you have a job going over 40mph on the terrible Maltese roads, and they are even introducing hidden speed cameras set at 27mph.....
Still see plenty of exotica though, Ferraris and the like.........
Joecooool said:Importing a vehicle, such as a Viper or Corvette from the US, attracts 10% import duty, then 17.5% VAT and then you have shipping and the SVA type approval to go through.
So is it just VAT or is there an additional tax? Why can't you import a vehicle yourself?
Even with all this, you can still get a brand new US supplied Viper in the UK for under £60k, whereas a dealer supplied one will cost £80k
What really annoys me is when they use the excuse that converting to right hand drive costs a lot of money and hence the price hike, but then they still hike the price of left hand drive imported cars. US supplied cars are cheap but the left hand drive puts a lot of people off.
Japanese imports are popular due to their right hand drive construction, but often don't have the same equipment levels. Dealers in the UK can shun imports using lame excuses putting many people off.
Most people in the UK seem happy to pay over the top for a standard car...
viper_larry said:
Japanese imports are popular due to their right hand drive construction, but often don't have the same equipment levels. Dealers in the UK can shun imports using lame excuses putting many people off.
Most people in the UK seem happy to pay over the top for a standard car...
Really? Japanese cars in the USA have equal or have better equipment than many USA cars. Are the Japanese cars you get over there somehow different than ones we get?
Oh someone mentioned your gas prices have also doubled as ours has in the USA. Now how is that possible considering the tax is the majority cost of your fuel?
The actual wholesale cost of gasoline must be about the same as ours so even if the fuel costs double it should not account for a doubling at the pump when the tax per gallon is added.
pdV6 said:
A question for you people, did your gas price double in the last 10 years?
Certainly did! (Or thereabouts, anyway)
>> Edited by pdV6 on Wednesday 22 June 15:55
Yup!!! I remember when I started driving 10 years ago I could fill my my car at a cost of 34.9p a litre. Now I struggle to find fuel for less than 86p a litre, even more if I'm filling the Tiv and need Optimax.
cnh1990 said:
Really? Japanese cars in the USA have equal or have better equipment than many USA cars. Are the Japanese cars you get over there somehow different than ones we get?
Possibly. However, grey imports to the UK from Japan are often more highly specced than the official equivalents
cnh1990 said:
Oh someone mentioned your gas prices have also doubled as ours has in the USA. Now how is that possible considering the tax is the majority cost of your fuel?
A string of "kind" chancellors have raised the tax from time to time.
-DeaDLocK- said:
What about prices in Malaysia/Singapore? In Malaysia a Ferrari 360 will cost you about £300k, and you have to factor in the fact that your average Malaysian earns a fifth of your average Brit.
Cars in England are NOT expensive by world standards - only when compared to some of continental Europe and the US.
I used to work with a Malaysian guy and he told me that when buying a car you have to buy a licence or something that costs the same as the car effectivly doubleing the price
Also in Portugal when trading in or selling on privatly your old car you must pay a percentage back in tax despite having paid tax on the original purchase
. So indeed the in the UK we have things pretty good...............
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ish...........
pdV6 said:
A string of "kind" chancellors have raised the tax from time to time.
I recall the USA was once a happy colony of England before they over taxed and jerked the residents around. I see that the leaders have not learned the lesson of the ancestors. So when is the next revolution/rebellion?
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