Graeme Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 http://www.westfield-r1.me.uk/ Is this worth a look?? I have a budget of about £13k for either a Westie or Caterham (don't start anything about pros and cons please!! - want a fun, reliable, fast road / track car that will not loose me too much money if I have to sell in a couple years - what do you think?? Quote
Al Yupright Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 The owner, Tony something, used to post on here about it a fair bit. How much is the asking price? As it is a live axle (not the independant) and as its not a 'factory' fit engine (ie megablade, megabusa, megabird), it will probably be worth less than one of these. If your budget is 13K, you could have a Megabusa which is the most road friendly of the bike engined variants as it is still quite torquey. Quote
adamnreeves Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 I think this will spark some comparisions in answering your question. Opionions are gonig to be biased in this forum! But anyway I believe that the Westfield car is better of course, but leaving that behind. You don't say if you want to buy new, I am assuming not as £13,000 will not do it in either case. I am also assuming that you want to buy a ready built car. Its been a while since I did price comparions but the caterham costs more to start of with. Depreciation I think is steeper for the Westfield. So as per normal when buying cars: buying new you want to go for lower depreciation, i.e. keep hold of you investment. When buying secondhand, depreciation is your friend, i.e. you get a lot more car for your money, depending on the age of the car you can find that depreciation from when you bought the car is not so bad in real terms. I could be flamed for this, might be a good idea to go for a factory built one, only because this will probably have lower depreciation whether rightly or wrongly. Unless of course you see something special. Quote
Blatman Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 Depreciation I think is steeper for the Westfield. You think wrong... Quote
adamnreeves Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 Depreciation I think is steeper for the Westfield. You think wrong... Oh, when I was looking at the marketplace, which I did't do completely scientifically. Looked at caterhams and westfields which were less than 2 years old and caterhams did some more expensive. Quote
Blatman Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 They are more expensive, but then they were more expensive to start with. Depreciation should be worked out as a percentage of the new cost, not in the actual number of pound notes that change hands. Do it as a percentage, and they are about the same... Quote
adamnreeves Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 They are more expensive, but then they were more expensive to start with. Depreciation should be worked out as a percentage of the new cost, not in the actual number of pound notes that change hands. Do it as a percentage, and they are about the same... I know mate, this is why I said in real terms, but anyway very difficult to compare like with like and have the required prices in market place etc. As each car is unique also. I have therefore scoured the net and found two factory built used cars that are 2 years old and very similiar spec in terms of performance with each other, phew. I have obtained the original list prices and done the comparisons as below: new caterham classic fact build £15,450 2004 caterham classic fact build £13,995 depreciation over two years £1455 depreciation over two years is 9.4% this seems very low. westfield sport 2000 fact build £19,950 2004 westfield sport 2000 £14,999 depreciate over two years £4951 depreciation over two years is 33% this seems high in comparison to the caterham. I haven't got the analysis last time I did this but I do not think the differential was this great. This information has been gathered from www.caterham.co.uk, westfield-sportscars.co.uk and www.autotrader.co.uk Quote
Chasmon Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 I ahve to agree with what Adam is saying. I believe you could build a Caterham and buy as little from them as you can get away with finsh it nicely and sell for a profit. Unfrtunately you'd struggle to do the same for the Westfield. I bought a Westfield though as I wanted one. Quote
adamnreeves Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 I ahve to agree with what Adam is saying. I believe you could build a Caterham and buy as little from them as you can get away with finsh it nicely and sell for a profit. Unfrtunately you'd struggle to do the same for the Westfield. I bought a Westfield though as I wanted one. Yep I bought a westfield because at the time, but not sure know, I thought the westfield had a larger cockpit and also the caterham did not have IRS (I may be wrong here to). But I do prefer the look of the westfield over the caterham and I think westfield and the community of westfield is more friendly. At the end of the day I did not buy the westfield to sell and make a profit, I bought it because I like the car. Quote
Blatman Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 Caterham Classic is a live axled 1.4 K series, IIRC. Hardly comparing eggs with eggs. The 2.0l Westfield is the R300/R400 equivalent. Do the maths on those... Quote
Chasmon Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 We were talking about depreciation not value for money; percentages not actual cost or value... OK I'll concede that the numbers on those may be different, but I believe the lower models of Caterham do depreciate less... Quote
Blatman Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 Check this R300: http://www.r300.net/index.p....247#247 This is a 30 grand + car. 1 year later, it's up for 22K. Best part of 30% depreciation. If this is what the market is currently supporting, and I have no reason to believe otherwise, depreciation is clearly simialr for similarly specced cars. This one seems to be much the same: http://www.blatchat.com/T.asp?id=94377 And another: http://www.blatchat.com/T.asp?id=91520 I could go on, and these are all R300's which is probably the most popular, and therefore most sought after so it should hold it's price better. The spec compares favourably with the 2.0l Westfield Duratec on TB's apart from the K series cheese engine which is plainly worth less than a 2.0l Duratec... Quote
Blatman Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 We were talking about depreciation not value for money; percentages not actual cost or value... OK I'll concede that the numbers on those may be different, but I believe the lower models of Caterham do depreciate less... And Adam is not comparing apples with apples, as I have already said... I agree that the classic depreciates less, but then so would a similarly specced Westfield. Trust me... Quote
Chasmon Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 They are more expensive, but then they were more expensive to start with. Depreciation should be worked out as a percentage of the new cost, not in the actual number of pound notes that change hands. Do it as a percentage, and they are about the same... Quote
Blatman Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 I'm too lazy to do the maths, but a quick 'n' dirty count up suggets that a 30K car that won't sell at 20K is losing at least 30%, which seems like a familiar figure Quote
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