Most motoring advice online is written to sell you a different car. This site starts from the opposite assumption: that the car on your driveway is probably the cheapest one you will ever own, and that the useful questions are what it actually costs, what you can maintain yourself, and which journeys are worth making in it at all.
What you will find here
- Costs, honestly counted. Including depreciation, which never appears on a bank statement and is usually the second-largest expense of car ownership.
- Maintenance you can do. A clear line between the jobs an ordinary person can safely take on and the ones that belong to a qualified mechanic.
- Free calculators. They run entirely in your browser. Nothing you type is stored, sent anywhere or logged.
- Alternatives to driving — costed properly, and without pretending that a bus every 40 minutes is a serious commute.
How we handle figures
Every number that could affect a decision is sourced and dated at the foot of the page it appears on. Where a figure is an illustrative worked example rather than a national average, we say so. UK motoring costs change constantly — tax bands each April, fuel weekly, insurance with your postcode — so pages carry a “last reviewed” date and get revisited rather than left to rot.
Where we are uncertain, we say we are uncertain. Where an official source exists — gov.uk for tax and MOT rules, DVSA for test data — we link to it rather than paraphrasing it and hoping.
What this site is not
- Not a garage. Nothing here is a substitute for a qualified mechanic inspecting your car, and we say so on every page that touches brakes, suspension or high-voltage systems.
- Not financial advice. We can tell you what a car costs. What you should do about it depends on circumstances we know nothing about.
- Not sponsored by anyone. No manufacturer, insurer, garage chain or comparison site pays for coverage, placement or a kind word here.
Corrections
If a figure here is wrong, out of date, or true in England but not in Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland, we would rather know. Get in touch and point at the specific line — corrections get made and the review date gets updated.