Depreciation can be an absolute blessing or a real problem when it comes to buying a car! In 2015, I was after a new car, as some friends wanted to buy the 2011 Chevrolet Cruze 1.6 LT which I had owned for the past three and a half years. I looked around for a replacement, and found this 2014 Chevrolet Cruze 1.7 LT Turbo Diesel at a car supermarket in Portsmouth. Costing around £18,500 new, within 18 months and 24,000 miles, the car lost £11,000! This was excellent news for me as I passed on my petrol Cruze to my friends and drove away in my new Turbo Diesel.
Being a post-facelift model (the Cruze was updated in late 2012), this had some minor exterior changes, such as new chrome flashes next to the fog lights and different alloy wheels as well as some interior upgrades. The trip computer, very useful on such an economical car, was also different. This was during a time when four of us were regularly driving both the cars I owned (this and the 1996 Rover 216), and there was always a fight over the keys for the Chevy.
I was quoted when I had got the 2011 Cruze that it had 122 bhp, but it certainly never felt like that. It always seemed like a heavy car, although the over-assisted electric power steering meant that it wasn't hard to drive. It also had poor fuel economy and relatively unimpressive carbon monoxide emissions. Suddenly, all this changed. The annual tax went down from £155 per year to £30, the fuel economy went from 36 to 52 (or more) and the power jumped to 130 bhp with a huge increase in torque. The 1.7 litre Opel diesel engine (the same one fitted to a variety of Vauxhalls and Chevrolets as well) made the car a touch nose heavy in comparison with the 1.6 litre petrol found in my previous car, but it was transformed in terms of performance.
As the new car had a six speed gearbox, as opposed to five speeds, it was also more relaxing on the motorway, whilst also being much more economical. Apart from the extra speed in the transmission, the car also had a much heavier clutch to get used to, and was much noiser at start up. It also took an absolute age to warm up on cold days, but it always started fine, which shows just how far modern diesels have come on.
Racking up an impressive 27,000 miles in my 20 months of ownership (which was brought upon by heavy use from all four of us drivers), the only problems I had with the car were physical damage when it received some parking scrapes, and then wear and tear issues. I had to change all the tyres and brakes during my ownership, as well as ensure that the car was regularly serviced with frequent oil changes, otherwise the diesel particulate filter became clogged, which can be a nightmare...
I did sometimes regret not having chosen a higher trim level (the LTZ came with sat nav, Bluetooth and a colour touch screen with a reversing camera, all of which were absent from this mid spec LT version), but overall these Cruzes are quite well equipped. The seats are generally comfortable, although the fabric can start to wear thin after around 40,000 miles, and the trim never rattled or came loose.
The main issue with the car was actually, once again, depreciation. In May 2017, I heard about the London proposed ULEZ (yes, that old chestnut again: https://www.lloydvehicleconsulting.co.uk/articles/), and realised that as a pre-2015 diesel, the value of my car had plummeted to around £4,000 from the £7,500 I had paid in 2015. This, combined with the fact that the car was not going to be compliant with the new zone, meant that the colossal loss of value (around £200 a month) was unsustainable. Thus, I was very pleased to be able to sell her on to two of those who had racked up the most miles in her, and, as they lived in Hampshire, were well outside the London ULEZ.
I very much miss my old car, but I was able to move on and buy a brand new petrol car (which, perhaps unsurprisingly, also seems to suffer from colossal depreciation), knowing that she had gone to a good home. Chevrolet Cruzes are reliable, strong and stylish cars which, apart from almost complete invisibility on the secondhand market and the aforementioned depreciation issues, have no serious drawbacks. They are much cheaper than the closely related Vauxhall Astras, have more space, generally better standard equipment, and are far less common. I would buy another one tomorrow if I needed it!
