Nice! I have a 993 C2 coupe - manual of course. It's the only vehicle other than my previous land cruiser that increases in value as I drive it.

Funny enough - I'm picking up a 2016 LR4 HSE Lux this week that has most of the same features as the Defender. At $15K I feel it's a better value than the $90K Defender with crushing monthly depreciation on top of eye watering parts and labor costs. The pre-purchase inspection on this LR4 performed by the dealer found $11K in deferred maintenance. It's mechanically totaled due to needing brakes, fluids, filters, and lower control arms (LCAs). I can purchase the parts from FCP Euro, which have a lifetime warranty (they'll even warranty used oil and brakes), and do all the labor but the LCAs myself for under $2K. The result is a minty fresh truck - I can live with that.

I'll pick up another Defender in a few years when the prices come down.

 

How coincidental. I'm doing the same thing here on the 31st. I'm not really keen to get back into a Defender after my first one but I've always wanted an LR4 anyway. Good luck with yours.

 

I don't want to be the harbinger of ill omens but those who were waiting for car prices to come back down to earth after the COVID nonsense are going to be waiting until eternity unfortunately.

Yes the supply chain issues, and easy free money are for the most part over - the way inflation works is that unless there is truly a calamitous economic event (like the 2007/8 financial crisis) or conditions resulting in deflation, prices will not come down. They'll just rise more slowly. Wages may eventually catchup to the crazy going on, but again, you're going to be waiting for a while for that.

The cost inputs for manufacturing, shipping and selling a Defender haven't gone down - and won't (except perhaps in the aforementioned calamitous economic event).

As for depreciation, Luxury SUV's always depreciate heavily. Just be glad you're not considering a BMW XM. (Almost 50% depreciation in 1 year and < 10k miles)

 

Dont ever use Carmax or any of those buy in bulk car sales guys - insulting values offered on cars that deserve better. I had them evaluate my 2023 P400X (purchased for 102K with 11,000 miles at time of sale) late last year and they offered $65K - absolutely not. I listed it on Auto Trader (absolute tire kickers), and eBay Motors - and found a buyer in through eBay in Phoenix who paid my asking price of $82K.

My first Defender - 2021 P400SE - purchased for $78K and traded in with my dealership - 14K miles on the clock, traded for $60K.

The simple answer is there will be massive depreciation on most cars if you sell them to people who offer bottom dollar prices. Hold out for the right price.

 

A consistent number I tend to see for appraisals is about 7k under retail. So if you gather some info from dealer inventory in your area that is similar spec/trim level as what you have then average a few of those similar data points and subtract 7k; that seems to land just about where most places come in with an offer then they'll flip it for the 7k profit, on top of whatever else they can get on the sale of a new one which I suspect is usually substantially less than 7k. 10k is what I believe they're typically shooting for to clear between the trade and a new vehicle purchase lately. It unfortunately leaves an enormous amount of buyers solidly underwater for a long time.

Notice there are more lease deals than ever now as imo they're getting desperate to appeal to these people who are trying to get out of a negative equity situation. I have been fairly lucky, I was 1k underwater when I traded the Defender, but that was covid-aided. The passport I sold to carmax last month, I was $1700 underwater on that but I had a payment a week away for $780 when I sold it plus it had the stock tires which needed to be replaced imminently so that would've been another 1k. I felt like I got out of those pretty much even. The LR4 payment will be trivial but no warranty so I'll have to be starting with a reserve fund plus adding a good amount to it each month to self-insure.

 

The car market is getting interesting. The price on new cars is getting way out of hand. The sweet spot if you are going to purchase a luxury car is a 2-3 year old one coming off a low mileage lease. You can pretty much get these for 40% off MSRP and still have a bit of warranty left to sort out any unresolved issues. The Defender has actually fared pretty well on the used market for a LR product. The big problem these days is nobody sells a car on their own anymore unless it's old used up and cheap. Most people either have to finance or chose to do so to keep their cash solvent so selling private party is nearly impossible. If you use a local bank It can be done with a level of trust otherwise the borrower has to pay off the note, wait for the title (2-3 weeks), then transfer it to the new owner. That's why most people just take the hit selling to a dealership or trade it in.

 

I was thinking the same thing when I read that post. Porsche's configurator is really extreme. Custom painted key fobs, embossing on armrest and headrests, body colored wheels. The list goes on and on.

 

Getting some of the money back from those options won't be easy, carmax and the like will have no earthly idea how to properly appraise it. They'll look at auction values and take a low-ball guess based upon an average. In fact certain vehicles they will not bother to resell, it will go straight to auction and in those cases they will make an offer but it's a dirt cheap wholesale auction price. What they get right are like what I sold to them a Passport Trailsport, it only comes with certain equipment, there's zero customization aside from paint color. I added a heated steering wheel for $800 when I took delivery as an accessory add on. That's one of the few things you could add to a '22 and it's just dealer installed. When it came time for appraisal nobody ever asked if I had the heated wheel or cared. So my point is with these vehicles that have so many options and sell few units relatively speaking the chances are the appraiser will look at a few auction prices from cars that have an average number of options and if yours has twice as many options as the average then I expect those will be entirely off the radar.... unless you take it back to the dealership. That's the way to go IMO; the JLR dealership did make me one of the better offers for my Defender, I just remember at the time they had nothing coming off-lease that interested me.

 

Defender is not widely popular, niche market car unlike 911s. And previous LR reliability didn't help either so it's expected to have heavy depreciations.
So this is not the car you take it to Carmax like BMW 3 series or Camry. You just have to sell privately and invest enough time to advertise and find the right buyer. If we really care about depreciation to begin with, I'm sure most of us are in 4 Runner forums.

 

A good line on depreciation is quite simply the residual after a three year lease. The bank sets that.... you can find that out before financing so you have no surprises down the road. Not that it's perfect, it can be 'off' by a couple of thousand after the lease is up depending upon the market but it isn't going to be way off year after year.

As far as I recall when I bought my Defender a few years back they were in the upper 50's% for residual. Maybe it's better now than it was a few years back. It could even be 60% now but that type of percentage in the 50s is typical even across mainstream brands. (sadly) It seems astonishing to people who go in for a 90k spec because they aren't looking at the percentage but looking at the total dollars worth of depreciation. In that case buying a low-spec one is probably where the best value retention will be. Even Toyota/Honda aren't that immune, people think they hold great value and they do generally well but it's the retail value that usually holds, the trade in number is again well under that, I would say figure approx 7k or so less than retail, so unless you're doing a private sale it's going to be a challenge to get what it's worth. If they're giving you 4k under retail they're making that up on the other side of the deal by selling you the new one. They definitely aren't running a charitable operation.