What did it cost you to drive your TDI.

[Philpug]

Some are happy with their buyback numbers, some are not, some are not happy there is a mileage penalty. I would like to compare net cost to others. Taking out the variables, fuel, maintainance and interest, I paid (approx) $27,000 for my 2010 JSW, buyback is $13,000, I drove 145,000 miles, so my cost of miles for my car is about 9.6 cents/mile. If I keep the car longer, and drive it the same amount I have been, it will drop per mile. What are others costs here?

 

[jims2321]

with mileage adjustments, I actually make money on the buyback.

2013 Jetta TDI 6MT - out the door 21500.

Factor out diesel, insurance, tag renewal (my only costs).

I have 33K with the adjustment getting back about $23,700

I know my situation is atypical.

 

[Gavin]

Buyback for me seems good also.

2012 base golf tdi bought used 2013 with 6kmiles for $21500 +tax

Driven it for 3 years now at 53k mi
Buyback is $20,026.76

So only $1,473.24 less than I bought it for.

Put $4500 down and got a 6 year loan. Owe $10,572 right now so I walk away with $9,454.73 which I'll pay off my $2500 credit card debt and put the rest down on a new car.

Oops forgot to calculate cost per mile.

So I've put around 47,400 mi on it and have a 1,473.24 difference in price paid vs buyback.

So 1473.24÷47,400= .03108c per mile lol
Sent from my SM-N910P using Tapatalk

 

[imurrx]

OTD $23500 and buyback $17024, owe $7100 (bought used in 2012)drove 54000 miles since bought.

Over 4 years I have spent the following:
$6000 payments
$2000 maintenance
$1000 repairs
$1000 tires

18.5¢/mile or $208/month. All numbers are approximate.

All things considered, if I bought a decent new equivalen gasser (my Jetta was used as well). It would probably cost less to drive than my TDI even with gas factored in.

 

[jetlagmech]

2010 Jetta sedan. bought new $23,080 out the door.
fed gave me $1500 tax credit for alternative fuel vehicle (lot of people forgetting that)
VW gave me $1000 cards
site says my buyback is $7000 plus $5100
if I sell car should be able to get close to $1000 for set of wheels and tires and tools I have if I don't go back to a VW
miles now is 140,000

so if I sell back it has cost me $7400 for use of car 6 years or $.052 cents per mile
tires, brakes, battery, insurance, registration, repairs done I figure is PM and has to be done on any car.

But the $5100 I would get anyway so the question is...... do I want to sell my car back for $7000. Not right now, it is worth more to me than that...... but if I have 2 more years to drive it then it might be of age that I would be looking at a newer one anyway and then $7000 for a 8 year old car just might be worth it. or $6500 if more mileage deduction by then.

forgot to calculate fuel into that. 42 mpg (my lifetime average FUELLY) as compared to another car about 33 mpg. that's about $2000 in fuel savings. Of course if I had a Prius instead then its about $2000 more in fuel costs.

 

[grawk]

OTD $23500 and buyback $17024, owe $7100 (bought used in 2012)drove 54000 miles since bought.

Over 4 years I have spent the following:
$6000 payments
$2000 maintenance
$1000 repairs
$1000 tires

18.5¢/mile or $208/month. All numbers are approximate.

All things considered, if I bought a decent new equivalen gasser (my Jetta was used as well). It would probably cost less to drive than my TDI even with gas factored in.

I'd love to see a car that costs $0.185 c/m to operate. There's a reason why the federal mileage rate is over $0.50 c/m.

 

[S2000_guy]

Some are happy with their buyback numbers, some are not, some are not happy there is a mileage penalty. I would like to compare net cost to others. Taking out the variables, fuel, maintainance and interest, I paid (approx) $27,000 for my 2010 JSW, buyback is $13,000, I drove 145,000 miles, so my cost of miles for my car is about .096 cents/mile. If I keep the car longer, and drive it the same amount I have been, it will drop per mile. What are others costs here?

Actually, your cost is 9.6 cents per mile. And you apparently did not assign any value to the $500/$500 cards from the Goodwill program. They're separate from the settlement, but they reduced my costs of ownership.

 

[Airpizz6]

'15 Passat TDI SEL. Purchased Aug 15. Out the door $29.6K. No loan.

Current mileage - 13200

Fuel costs - $780
Insurance - $450

Cost per mile as 0f 5 Aug 16 - $2.34 Pretty bad, but..

**************************
Buyback - Sep 18 ---- $34.2K at 39000 miles
Goodwill package ---- $ 1.0K

Fuel coats (present- Sep 18) $1600
Insurance ( " ) $1000
Maintenance $1000
Registration $ 180

Total expended at buyback $34610
Buyback and Goodwill $35200

In Sep 18 I think that comes to minus 1.5 cents/mile. Even if I throw in the $200 of lost savings account interest, I would still end up with a negative number. Literally a free car for three years. Hard to complain about that.

 

[jhinsc]

I'm getting about $2,000 less than I paid for it. At somewhere around 50k miles, I'm at 4 cents/mile. Due to fuel discounts, diesel costs have been running at 4.4 cents/mile. This has been my lowest cost vehicle to run and operate.

 

[Philpug]

Actually, your cost is 9.6 cents per mile. And you apparently did not assign any value to the $500/$500 cards from the Goodwill program. They're separate from the settlement, but they reduced my costs of ownership.

Oops. Corrected.

 

[MaddogTDI]

Overall, I can't complain with the cost of the car per mile. My calcs do not including diesel, maintenance (which was very little cost to me), insurance, taxes, registration, etc. because I would have paid similar for any other car... so from a purely "equipment cost basis" perspective I'm at less then $0.06 per mile.

Purchase Date June 2011
Purchase price $25,000
======================
Goodwill Debit Card $500
Goodwill Dealer Card $250 Haven’t used the full amount…???
Buyback $19,500
======================
Total equipment cost $4,750 Purchase - (Goodwill cards + buyback)
======================
Cost per year $950
Cost per month $79
======================
Miles driven 80,000
Cost per mile $0.059
======================

This compares almost exactly to the cost of my 1989 Toyota Pickup ($0.06/mile) which was so basic it had a bench seat, no extra room in the cab, roll up windows, no AC, and didn't even have a radio or a bumper! So my VW Golf TDI, one of the best cars on the planet today, cost me less per mile than a bare bones pickup truck I purchased over 20 years ago... Like I said at the beginning of this post, I can't complain!

 

[USCGTO]

without including 1 complete set of tires and approx 1200 gallons of diesel + insurance for last 2 years and the cost of window tinting plus clear bra plus the sales tax, I am getting 4k more than what I paid for this TDi 2 yrs back.

 

[nwtim]

I was planning to keep the car for 20 years if I liked it enough and to have maximum resale value if I didn't. I don't put that many miles on a car so depreciation was one of the more important costs for me to minimize. That didn't really work out too well...

 

[cavymeister]

Delta for my sell back/versus purchase will be about $3500.

I've spent $5,500 in fuel, $500 in maintenance, $3,350 in insurance, and VW paid for my tires and filters so it all went back into the car. I can't imagine I have spent more than $100 or so on car washes, etc. I can't recall taxes etc.

$12,950 total cost, 82,000, 28 month.


$463/month or $0.158/mile.



Just the car itself, I'm looking at $0.0427/mile.

 

[2015vwgolfdiesel]

(IF) I turned it in NOW

...all the math ~~ including the 2 CARDS ~~ they would pay me ~~

$1.79 per mile

 

[joec]

2015 Golf Sportwagen TDI S:

I paid $35k with the extended warranty, prepaid maintenance, and gap coverage (it was my first ever car, seemed like a good idea at the time).

They'll give me $26,641. I'm willing to consider the $500 gift card but not the dealer card, and the dealer will refund me $3k of the 'extras', pro-rated. That's $30,141... if the dealer actually refunds that stuff. The clock is ticking on the pro-rated part.

Total if I did it today would be $4859, so $0.32 per mile. If they are jerks about what they actually refund, that could go up over $0.40 per mile for just the car. It's been about $0.07/mile for insurance and about $0.08/mile for fuel, so the total to me is as high as $0.55 per mile. I guess I didn't realize car ownership would be so expensive... maybe I picked the wrong car after all. Did I get hosed?

 

[grawk]

Any car you're going to drive requires fuel and insurance (and tires and maintenance). If you're risk averse, gap insurance and extended warranty will be there on purchased cars as well.

Spending $35k on a car worth about $25k, well, I'm assuming they saw you coming. Your best bet is to sell it back 12/18 and get the most value out of the car in the mean time you can.

 

[jhinsc]

You can run the numbers a variety of different ways to justify why you should or shouldn't do the buyback, or why you think you're getting raw deal or not. Bottom line, what you paid vs what you're getting on the buyback is all you need to know. The difference divided by the miles driven during ownership is your actual cost to own the car during the time you had it. Fuel, insurance, maintenance cost are all things you would have had in another car so it makes no sense it adding those in, unless something unusual like a high dollar major repair item you were not expecting. Me, I had to replace 2 tires due to an unrepairable flat tire, thanks to VW good will, didn't cost me anything. Yesterday, I had to pay $119 to fix my a/c, during my 50k service appointment, I'm not bothered by it, even if I'll have the car only another couple months. But to go through the rest of summer with possibility of no a/c, it was worth the expense. It was low on refrigerant, and after checking for leaks, which took time - none found - they topped it off. I know if I go into another comparable car, VW or other brand, it won't be a TDI, so my "cost to drive" will go up unless it a hybrid, no matter which way I look at it.

 

[kjclow]

Here's my numbers:
2010 JSW - Paid around $26k. Has about 98K miles on it today. Offer of $5100 for fix or $14500 for buyback. So if I take the buyback , it will have cost me about 12 cents per mile. Add in about $2500 in maintenance and my cost per mile goes up to 14 cents. 13 cents per mile adding in the gift cards.

2011 Golf - paid around $24K. (year end close out) Has about 45K miles. Offer of $6050 for fix or $21350 for buyback. Buyback cost works out to 6 cents per mile. I don't think we've done the 40k service on this yet but have put a set of tires on. So that would increase the cost per mile to 7 cents. 5 cents per mile adding in the gift cards.

Insurance and fuel would be necessary for any car that I would have owned over the last six years, so I won't even try to calculate those values. Plus in that time frame I've gone from two teenage drivers to none and five cars to four. The buyback on the Golf helps to reduce the total number of cars and payoff school loans. Only other place I'm getting a check for $20k+ is if I win the lottery.

 

[joec]

Any car you're going to drive requires fuel and insurance (and tires and maintenance). If you're risk averse, gap insurance and extended warranty will be there on purchased cars as well.

Spending $35k on a car worth about $25k, well, I'm assuming they saw you coming. Your best bet is to sell it back 12/18 and get the most value out of the car in the mean time you can.

They said the MSRP was over $28k, and then there was the $850 destination charge and sales tax- even if I skipped the gap coverage, maintenance, and warranty extension is there any way I could have picked up a Golf Sportwagen TDI S for less than $30k? I don't see how.

Edit- I might have misremembered how they said it... it could have been $24,595 msrp plus $1,100 for the DSG, $850 destination charge, $2,256 sales tax, so total of $28,800 before adding the cost of interest at 0.9% (about $500 total) and monster floor mats (about $300, and totally worth it after having one catch a whole spilled latte without spilling a drop).. that means $5400 for the Care Plus maintenance, gap coverage, and warranty extension.. which they're still willing to refund pro-rated right now if I want them to.

 

[grawk]

MSRP is never a number to which money is added when buying a VW, at least in the 20 years I've been doing it.

 

[joec]

So do you just get them to throw out the destination charge and sales tax, or.....?

I'm seriously new to owning a vehicle other than a bicycle. You're making me think they were up to some crooked business.

 

[kjclow]

At least on my VWs, the starting price was different for the manual versus the DSG. It might have been an $1100 upcharge, but it was not a line item charge. MSRP is typically the bottom price on the sticker that includes the destination fee and any included packages. Most dealers also have additional addons, such as paint treatment, and the infomous doc fees. There have been times where some cars also had a "market" adjustment, which was a fancy way of saying, "these cars are hot and if you want one, you'll have to pay through the nose." When I bought my JSW in March of 2010, they were few and far between and many dealers had a market adjustment price. The local dealer I used, didn't do that but also did not budge off the MSRP. They did give me a better price for the trade, so it still worked out.

 

[fireinsyrup]

Around ~$30k out the door new, DSG and Sunroof
VW is offering ~$18,500

I messed around with the return date on the VWGoA Online Claims site, and set it to July 2017 and the value stayed the same. I estimate my mileage to be around 110,000 miles by then.
$11,500 / 110,000 = ¢10.45

If you want to factor in cost of owning a car...

Gas
110,000 miles / Avg 35mpg = 3142 Gallons
3142 * Avg $3/gallon = $9,428

Maintenance
7 Oil Changes * ~$86 = $602
2 DSG Service = ~$300
Fuel Filter = ~$70
Tires = ~$800
Faulty Glow Plug Repair = ~$100
1 New Battery = $160

Insurance
~$1500 * 6 Years = $9000

Registration
$160 * 6 Years = $960

Adds up to $21,260
$21,420 + $11,500 = $32,920
$32,920 / 110,000 miles = ¢29.9

I think that's pretty good! Might just pick up a GTI now.

 

[grawk]

So do you just get them to throw out the destination charge and sales tax, or.....?

I'm seriously new to owning a vehicle other than a bicycle. You're making me think they were up to some crooked business.

www.edmunds.com, get the trucar price. Take that to the dealer, that's your actual price. Don't let them sell you anything else. Negotiate with as many dealers as you can reasonably get to to buy the car.

 

[Airpizz6]

You can run the numbers a variety of different ways to justify why you should or shouldn't do the buyback, or why you think you're getting raw deal or not. Bottom line, what you paid vs what you're getting on the buyback is all you need to know. The difference divided by the miles driven during ownership is your actual cost to own the car during the time you had it. Fuel, insurance, maintenance cost are all things you would have had in another car so it makes no sense it adding those in, unless something unusual like a high dollar major repair item you were not expecting. Me, I had to replace 2 tires due to an unrepairable flat tire, thanks to VW good will, didn't cost me anything. Yesterday, I had to pay $119 to fix my a/c, during my 50k service appointment, I'm not bothered by it, even if I'll have the car only another couple months. But to go through the rest of summer with possibility of no a/c, it was worth the expense. It was low on refrigerant, and after checking for leaks, which took time - none found - they topped it off. I know if I go into another comparable car, VW or other brand, it won't be a TDI, so my "cost to drive" will go up unless it a hybrid, no matter which way I look at it.

When one buys a house, you better consider the cost of utilities, taxes, insurance, etc, etc or you will looking at foreclosure very quickly. Similarly if you buy a car and actually plan to use it, you better budget for fuel, insurance, etc. To ignore them is pure folly. The question posed is this thread was what did it cost to drive your TDI. How do you drive it without using fuel and having it insured? Of course, many purchase diesels due to their fuel efficiency. If you are going to compare cost to drive across different vehicles, fuel usage will play significantly in the calculations.

 

[3CatGo]

2012 TDI JSW
Paid $27,700 + $1,600 in sales tax and fees = $29,300 in July 2012.

Current mileage = 104,000 +/-

Total maintenance & service = $3,983. This includes every single scheduled service (and it’s a DSG) as required, at a VW dealership, and this cost includes $1,346 spent on a total of 8 new tires.No other wear & tear parts have needed replacing.

Insurance about $600/year totals $2,400

Financing about $400 to date (0.9% on $23,000 borrowed for 5 years)
Assume we got 37 MPG overall, and call it $3.25/gallon over this period for $12,518 of fuel.

Throw in $500 in car washes.

This totals $49,101 (!!!). Over 104,000 miles that is 47.2 cents/mile.Pretty close to GSA rate.

My buyback is about $18,300, so if I sold today it would have cost us $30,801 to own and operate this car for 4.1 years, or 29.6 cents/mile.

My biggest issue with the buyback is that if (when) I buy a new $30,000 car here in PA, I’m out $1,800 in sales tax alone, a cost I am eating at least 6 years before I intended to sell this car. It is impeccably maintained and runs great, and I don’t get squat for that.

We’re selling before the 120,000 mile timing belt and DSG service ($2,000 at least), so we have at best 7 months to live with this magnificent vehicle. Volvo V60 is the current leader.

 

[luftwaffles]

Purchase - buyback = $2000
+ TTL, insurance, fuel, maintenance, tires
+ optional mods & accessories
- goodwill cards (assuming I make full use of the dealer card)

These calculations are based on estimated figures. If I look at the net cash expenditures and write off any residual value for stuff I can sell/reuse, my total costs have been around 24.5 cents/mile over 58k miles. My actual cost of ownership will be slightly less after I sell and reuse parts.

Taking out optional mods and assuming some residual value for my winter tires brings it to 20.7.

Take out insurance and TTL (which vary wildly) from the previous figure and I'm at 12.5c/mi (11.9 without winter tires, for you Southerners). To clarify, this last number includes purchase price, buyback, goodwill cards, fuel, maintenance, and tires. I think it's a number than can be meaningfully compared between similar vehicles driven by different drivers in different states.

My depreciation cost is 3.4c/mi, which is much better than the IRS standard rate of 23c/mi. (purchase - buyback)

It's also worth noting that I have not had to make a single major repair. Putting more miles on the car would reduce the per-mile cost of TTL, tires, and accessories, but eventual repairs would probably cancel it out.

EDIT: I would have to drive my replacement vehicle 13k-25k miles before I reach a lower cost-per-mile, depending which figure I use.

 

[grawk]

why not spend the $2000 and have the service done, and drive it til 12/18 and sell with approximately 160k on the clock?

 

[jhinsc]

When one buys a house, you better consider the cost of utilities, taxes, insurance, etc, etc or you will looking at foreclosure very quickly. Similarly if you buy a car and actually plan to use it, you better budget for fuel, insurance, etc. To ignore them is pure folly. The question posed is this thread was what did it cost to drive your TDI. How do you drive it without using fuel and having it insured? Of course, many purchase diesels due to their fuel efficiency. If you are going to compare cost to drive across different vehicles, fuel usage will play significantly in the calculations.

Yes, you are correct these should be considered seriously if you're buying a house or car in the future. Hell, I bought mine because of great fuel mileage. But I would have paid the insurance, fuel, and maintenance cost of anything else I would have bought, so throwing that all in, while an exercise just to see what it is, the numbers are meaningless when they can't be compared to anything or anyone else. My fuel costs are ultra low since I buy most of it at $1 off per gallon discount due to racking up fuel points each month. But I could be paying 2x a much, or half as much for insurance because of my driving record, which would raise or lower my driving costs. It's useless for comparison. But I will agree, after calculating all the associated cost of driving, I'm surprise any of us are still wanting to own a vehicle. Now I know why ridesharing is taking off, and if you live in NYC like some I know, they don't even bother owning a vehicle.