Well the C5 was collected today... 3yrs and 36k from new. A totally faultless experience and the most capable family car I've known.
Superb ride comfort and refinement for its class, very economical, packed with useful automation, perfectly integrated sat nav/bluetooth phone/music system, great carrying capacity for moving house twice.
Different to the average box but not trying to say anything particular about the driver.
And of course totally reliable.
Sourcing and leasing from Ling was so easy and efficient, the Manheim collection today was well organised but sadly Citroen Leasing had some frustrating admin wobbles along the way.
Leasing for private use was a total success with the needs we had at that time, the total cost was less than the depreciation had we bought it new with discount and no worries with having to hawk it round the dealers to trade in or sell now we wanted something different.
Excellent experience.
Last edited by: Fenlander on Wed 19 Dec 12 at 20:34
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Did they offer to sell it to you and had that been of interest would it have been a reasonable deal?
I had my Espace on one of those so much a month deals with the option to hand back or buy after two years and 80k miles. When they called me to ask what I'd like to do with it they explained that it probably wouldn't fit where I was suggesting. I imagine that was because there were several of them up there already...
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They did offer it at a reasonable price (giving no real concession to the huge amount of trouble it would have saved them though) but we decided our needs had changed so much there was no point taking it on for the sake of it. Also it was 900mls off a £500 service/brake/fluid/front pads so the timing was just right.
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>> Also it was 900mls off a £500 service/brake/fluid/front pads so the timing was just right.
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See thats whats wrong with these modern cars, how can a normal well looked after 3 year old 36k mile 4 cyl normal make estate car warrant such a ridiculous cost, that 1.6HDi only holds about 4 litres, Gucci oil is it..;)
Glad it worked out for you though FL, i liked the C5 but then i liked the previous one more in estate form, truly cavernous.
The model you had seemed shrunk from the drivers seat to me if that makes sense even though the car was considerably larger overall, they reminded me of when Omega replaced Carlton, much bigger car but that too gave me a claustrophobic feel after the light and airy previous model.
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Quite the fan of estates these days eh GB? How's your new one shaping up by the way?
Tum ti tum...
:-)
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Its not an estate its a soft roader or SUV or something, and its 'ers not mine, so there..;)
I've only driven the Outlander the once and its rather more fun than it should be, that full time 4x4 means it can be hurled down the roughest slippy roads at a fair old rate of knots without budging an inch, very direct precise steering, i'm quite taken with it and its cheap to run on propane.
I'll do a bit of a report on it in due course.
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I wasn't sure if you'd actually done the deal on the Outlander and meant to ask. I looked over one the other day and it looked better in the flesh than the wide angle images of the one you bought.
I know what you mean about the new C5 exterior/interior dimensions but I liked the "cockpit feel of the 2008-on model and the Tourer was a genuine load carrier. I don't want to run down the previous C5 in any detail but there was not one thing I liked about it and I'd never have bought one at any price point.
Worth mentioning Manheim found two issues on the C5 which they believed were outside the fair wear and tear guidelines. These two issues were very minor and they wanted me to sign on the spot for a liability of £180 to repair. I declined and said I'd negotiate it with the lease company... mainly as the car is 9000mls under the contract mileage of 45k which is worth much more than £180 to them.
We'll see how it goes.
Last edited by: Fenlander on Thu 20 Dec 12 at 08:38
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>> said I'd negotiate it with the lease company... mainly as the car is 9000mls under
>> the contract mileage of 45k which is worth much more than £180 to them.
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Aren't you due some money back from this ?
The lease on my wifes car if it is more than +-2500 then there is a cash payment due. Needless to say if we owe then the rate is higher/km than if the lease company owes us.
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Hmmm not sure. I know there is an excess mileage charge but can't remember anything clearly stated about fewer miles. My lease rate even at 15k/yr was so cheap I'd be happy if they just waive the repair charge.
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Assuming that your contract was the same as mine there was no benefit in returning it with a lower mileage, in fact I've never seen a contract that pays back if its under. My excess was only 3.Xppm + VAT, so say 4ppm its still only £400 for going 10,000 over
My final bill for damage was £160 which I agreed with, but the man from manheim said they may waive it as the value was low, but that it wasn't his call. About a week later I had a letter to state it had been waived as a good will gesture
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Thankfully a letter arrived today from Citroen saying they would not charge the £180 worth of small body repairs the inspector pointed out to me when they collected the C5. So that nicely rounds off an excellent 3yr experience... in no small part due to the keen pricing and excellent customer service and amusing experience from Lings leasing... but in truth mostly because the C5 was a superb family estate.
Last edited by: Fenlander on Fri 25 Jan 13 at 12:02
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Excellent news. I have read a few nightmare stories about PSA leasing, but we both appear to have had really good experiences
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>>>read a few nightmare stories about PSA leasing
Only issue we had was their inability to relate payments made to a calendar leading to a few emails where they insisted they would be taking two more payments than we knew were due.
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Citroen C5 II - 3yrs with a C5 Tourer - Runfer D'Hills
