I was just thinking that I have nicely escaped the motoring gutter once again, although I am mindful that I live only on the first kerb stone so am perilous close to said gutter, and I wondered if this is a concept which many other people share?
I know that my long time partner in crime Steve shares this concept, as we have discussed it a fair few times. It is different to (although related to) the “classic car ghetto” which is another one of our little expressions I bet others feel some resonance with.
I best explain these terms before we get into this. “The classic car ghetto” is a feature of insurance and limited funds. See many of us have been driving so long on classic car policies that we have no NCB any more. “Real” classic car policies have no No-Claims attached to them so after 2 years any discount you had from a normal car policy or one of those normal car policies which calls itself a classic policy but isn’t really will evaporate. At this point you are stuck with ludicrous insurance premiums because all insurance companies seem to think that anyone who has been driving 5+ years but doesn’t have a company car or any NCB must be a terrible driver and an awful risk. Hence when you think “I’ll just get a £300 Mondeo 1.8LX to punt about in over winter” and you find the premium is £1200 you crawl back into the classic car ghetto and look for something which will go on your existing classic policy. The definition of classic is usually 25 years old on these policies so you can be then stuck trying to find a car of daily driver quality with the features and functions you need for a price you can afford. Compromises often have to be made. Welcome to life in the classic car ghetto.
The motoring gutter can be a result of living in the classic car ghetto or can be fairly unrelated but always stems from reduced circumstances. And you never seem to see it coming. Usually what happens is you have a decent daily driver, followed by another, and another. And you build up a head of steam where usually selling one car to buy another puts you in the £1500-£2500 kind of price range where a good range of decent cars can usually be found. Now in my life there is no such thing as savings really. There is money which can be spent on cars and money which the wife knows about. Often there is none of either. What happens next is that the last trade you made turns out to be a turkey. You end up with a blown up engine or trans for example, an expensive or uncommon one of course. Or an MOT weldathon you don’t have time for nor can afford to pay someone else to do for you. Suddenly your daily driver value plummets from “about £2000” to “what can I weigh this in for?” And thus you find yourself in the gutter. Trying to find a decent daily for £200 or something, and if you are also in the classic car ghetto this can be very challenging to even find anything which may be easier to get an MOT on for that money...
Those of us with multiple cars then get pressure from the good lady of the house to sell one or more project cars or whatever 5 MPG unsuitable toy car or truck you have working in order to fund “something sensible, an Astra or Focus or something?”
This is where the classic car ghetto can actually act as a protection for you “well it would cost £200 a year to tax and £800 a year to insure, I have no no-claims”
So you then work your way through a series of hit and miss older bangers until you end up in something which makes you at least fairly happy, like I dunno, a V6 Mustang II, where at least you can see the horizon and feel like you are on the path to righteousness once more.
Or is this just me?
I know that my long time partner in crime Steve shares this concept, as we have discussed it a fair few times. It is different to (although related to) the “classic car ghetto” which is another one of our little expressions I bet others feel some resonance with.
I best explain these terms before we get into this. “The classic car ghetto” is a feature of insurance and limited funds. See many of us have been driving so long on classic car policies that we have no NCB any more. “Real” classic car policies have no No-Claims attached to them so after 2 years any discount you had from a normal car policy or one of those normal car policies which calls itself a classic policy but isn’t really will evaporate. At this point you are stuck with ludicrous insurance premiums because all insurance companies seem to think that anyone who has been driving 5+ years but doesn’t have a company car or any NCB must be a terrible driver and an awful risk. Hence when you think “I’ll just get a £300 Mondeo 1.8LX to punt about in over winter” and you find the premium is £1200 you crawl back into the classic car ghetto and look for something which will go on your existing classic policy. The definition of classic is usually 25 years old on these policies so you can be then stuck trying to find a car of daily driver quality with the features and functions you need for a price you can afford. Compromises often have to be made. Welcome to life in the classic car ghetto.
The motoring gutter can be a result of living in the classic car ghetto or can be fairly unrelated but always stems from reduced circumstances. And you never seem to see it coming. Usually what happens is you have a decent daily driver, followed by another, and another. And you build up a head of steam where usually selling one car to buy another puts you in the £1500-£2500 kind of price range where a good range of decent cars can usually be found. Now in my life there is no such thing as savings really. There is money which can be spent on cars and money which the wife knows about. Often there is none of either. What happens next is that the last trade you made turns out to be a turkey. You end up with a blown up engine or trans for example, an expensive or uncommon one of course. Or an MOT weldathon you don’t have time for nor can afford to pay someone else to do for you. Suddenly your daily driver value plummets from “about £2000” to “what can I weigh this in for?” And thus you find yourself in the gutter. Trying to find a decent daily for £200 or something, and if you are also in the classic car ghetto this can be very challenging to even find anything which may be easier to get an MOT on for that money...
Those of us with multiple cars then get pressure from the good lady of the house to sell one or more project cars or whatever 5 MPG unsuitable toy car or truck you have working in order to fund “something sensible, an Astra or Focus or something?”
This is where the classic car ghetto can actually act as a protection for you “well it would cost £200 a year to tax and £800 a year to insure, I have no no-claims”
So you then work your way through a series of hit and miss older bangers until you end up in something which makes you at least fairly happy, like I dunno, a V6 Mustang II, where at least you can see the horizon and feel like you are on the path to righteousness once more.
Or is this just me?
what with having being royally bummed by having spells of classic/commercial and bike insurance including gaps and canceled polices for change of vehicle due to fails and whimsical heart driven changes of transport.
Not a bad car tho.
, mostly choice though as i could save some pennies and get something half decent but I would get bored and I still like the conversations that start "not seen one of them for a while!" Also with most things half decent they will contain black boxes of elastic trickery and I am not keen on them, keeping the Lucas smoke inside is ok but that's about it 