I don't see any comparison between any of the above mentioned SUV's and my '06 CTT. The gas mileage [I get 13.5 city and 19 hwy ] isn't even an incentive to trade let alone ride, performance or interior comforts and as far as maintainance well every car is going to need something. Most of the V6's from the other makers only advertise 17 city and 23 hwy not a huge difference. I realize my CTT had an original sticker over $100k and most of the other SUV's are between $50 and $70 k but when you purchase used as I did you cut much of the original price down quickly.

 

I've got a 2005 CTT with >$100k sticker and it currently has 38k miles. What's a ballpark range I can expect in a private party sale?

 

I wouuld say around $35k but check here


http://www.kbb.com/

and here

http://www.edmunds.com/

 

I have a LCI X5 50i also. I have been a bimmer diehard all my life until a relative's 997 turbo S and my Cayenne change my perspective about what an ultimate driving machine is. Since I have a base V6, of course, it is quite slow compared to the twin turbo V8. Aside from the V8, I think the V6 Cayenne is a cut above my X5 in every other aspect - fit and finish (e.g., paint work, interior and exterior materials), handling (X5 with AD is already quite sporty but Cayenne has a even tighter and lighter chassis), and overall refinement (e.g., exhaust note, cabin quietness, and rattles). Take the active steering option on my X5 (as well as this new wave of "efficiency dynamics" badged BMWs) for example, the steering feel is either too light or too tight - well the new BMWs don't even have that tightness anymore, without any sensation of progressive adjustment according to your driving styles and vehicle speed. Again, I can pick things that are wrong in Cayenne too - pricing in particular. For a similarly equipped V6, I can afford another 50i that is nicely optioned - though it is made in South Carolina.

 

there are several reasons why:

1) price of fuel and the fact that cayenne S gets realistically 9-11mpg in city if you drive it like you are not a grand mother.
2) maintenance costs are incredibly high. porsche does not regulate this and thus dealers charge a thousand bucks to change spark plugs
3) the vehicle is a luxury, NOT a practicality. you can accomplish the same amount of passengers and features with a tahoe. you cannot however get the styling and performance.
4) porsche service (depending on the dealer) is horrible. my friend gets nicer people and better service all around at the honda dealer. my P dealer had no waiting room, rude people, no coffee, food, no loaner cars, no anything. just a salesman that comes over every 20 minutes trying to get you to buy a new $150k mistake. I change my own oil because they want $300 to do it. I do it for $80. my brother has a BMW and they call him in his car (bmw assist w built in cell phone in car standard!...whoulda thunk??) and remind him nicely of service, and then call him again when he is approaching the dealer to ask him what kind of coffee he would like waiting, they store his winter tires for free, its clear porsche's unregulated dealer's dont know jack about customer service and DONT care to learn.
5) 05-07 cayenne's lack basic features that are on other much cheaper vehicles. bluetooth, internal hard drive for audio library, and the nav map graphics are very out of date, even for the time. I have burnt over 75 CD's of Mp3's because i dont even have an AUX-IN audio port. WTH.


Porsche's Attitude in the mid 2000's was PERFORMANCE. they didnt want you doing anything else while driving this beast. they look at their creation as a driver's car for motoring, and thus the driver should be DRIVING at all times. Unfortunately their engineers didnt spend too much time in america during the design process where we have this concept of speed limits that prevent our entire US market (as a general rule, always exceptions) from buying a car for the THRILL and instead, keep our experience in motoring solely to mundane practical matters of getting kids somewhere or picking up or going to from places. this created a conflict of interests, porsche was giving us something we could not take full advantage of. and thus wiht our limitations, we wanted distractions in the car to make it still fun because we could only access 100hp before we hit 65mph. we wanted bluetooth, we wanted aux audio inputs, we wanted a rear radio and dvd screen. did we get any of that for our 90k? NO. we got POWER, we couldnt fully use. but it seemed nice at the time...right?

this leads me to my basic point...

STYLING and PERFORMANCE are NOT things people in this economy are willing to pay for. people are loosing their homes and jobs left and right, regardless of what the government says. for every 120k people that "grow" the job market every month, there are the same amount that fell off of unemployment and defaulted on their loans....there is NO fresh crop of yuppies jumping up to buy used cayennes, which makes their superiors jump up to buy new cayennes. why upgrade if the 06-07 models are not being driven by everyone? they are still extremely exclusive unlike most luxury models that age 5 years and then less economically fortunate people start driving them. like the Mercedes ML, or BMW X5. this is NOT the case with the cayenne, which has managed to keep a very high level clientelle because the costs of operating one are SO high and people associate massive expensive with the porsche badge. truth: porsche is above BMW and MERC, it is up there with ferrari and mas.

i have an 06 CS in mint condition ($84,599 sticker) with coolant pipes and drive shaft done, and the dealer offered me 19k for it only if i bought a new porsche. it had 68k miles on it at the time. I could private sale it now at 89,900 miles for 26k if I wanted to. Dealers will rip you and the bottom line is there is little market for these vehicles with the economy the way it is. generally the people who buy performance-luxury-used, are the people who are either too conservative to shell out for the new model, OR the upper middle class, which has basically disappeared, or is now reeling in and not spending their cash on toys anymore.

in contrast, my brothers 08' 335i BMW was $36k 2 years ago... guess the word gets out about customer service and oh, not to mention, the fact that BMW doesnt have customers suing them in class action lawsuits all over the country.

the cayenne is a "toy/non-essential" in a world of people who generally now can only afford necessities or worse, have the money but worry and are not buying more than they need.

remember how many yuppies in 2007 had two mortgages on their house and had a boat and a ride on 0-turn mower for a 30sq ft yard, and the jetskiis and the and the 60" plasma TV's, AND an off-lease porsche in their garage? ALL those people drove the economy under and themselves.
----------------------------------------------------------------
thats why the resale value is so low. if you've got the money, now is the time to swing a CTTS. you'll make a killing.

 

Very well said. I couldn't agree with you more.

 

I think you're a bit optimistic on price.. I paid that much for a 52,000 mile CS-**** with 2 years of CPO over a year ago.. It did seem like a good deal, but search and there are other good deals out there.Actually - BMW has settled a number of CAL's, and there are other ones progressing as I type. The latest is for exploding VANOs (variable-valve-timing mechanism) on S54 engines.. last one I know they settled on was for rear subframe mount failures - where the rear end bascially pulls itself out of the car. They are not immune to CAL's, and I find the dealer service about comparable to Porsche, both in how I'm treated and how well it's done. Ditto on the coffee - they both use the same machine.. I rather suspect this is the case with all German autos sold in the US - it's a very competitve market (in NJ, find a BMW dealer, and down the street will be Mercedes, Audi, and sometimes Porsche. And lots of times Jag and used-to-be Saab.)I looked at mine as a reasonable and reasonably priced alternative to a boring car - and I detest boring cars.. That's a failing that has probably cost me a small fortune through life, but it also has meant I've owned some really interesting cars..

 

Don,

you are VERY fortunate to have such good experiences with your P dealers. I have been to 4 different p dealers in 3 states (IN, OH, VA) and have had nothing but [used car lot buy here pay here] type service.

I had to replace two leather console grab handles and a steering wheel because the dealership in indy stained them with coolant and gave me my car back with a dead battery and yellow film all over it. when I called in to tell them (i had picked it up on a weekend), they told me they would pick up the cost of 1 grab handle minus installation. right.

I had a p dealer in ohio ask me to come STAND UNDER my car while they changed the oil so if the oil pan cracked, they "wouldn't be liable."

this same dealer scolded me upon arrival for being "15 minutes late" to a service appointment that I was in fact, on time for. and then claimed they "didnt know if any techs would be available because they closed in one hour"

Another dealer in Indy, wouldn't give me a loaner car during a service. I was literally standing at the end of a line of parked cars, 17 to be exact, that said "XXX XXXX Porsche of Indianapolis Courtesy Vehicle" the service manager denied me one, right there. claiming they were "all spoken for that day" (it was 11 am.)

I called PCNA in atlanta and made them aware of these events, or tried to. they cut me off a quarter way through the first part of this post to tell me that they have "no control over their dealers." yay.

these are true events. The ONLY thing that keeps a porsche in my garage, besides my paycheck, is the fact that even though I HATE the service, and the PCNA office demeanor... this car has an undeniable level of soul to it that I have not experienced before. love my car. detest the farse that is porsche service in the midwest.

 

Replied in red above. Couldnt disagree with you more on many points. Plain and simple the resale is based on an aging high end car. Happens to all of them.

 

Cole,
I've always kinda respected you because of your level of involvement with the forum. 804 posts is a pretty big deal.

I'll agree with you that some car makers add those features to distract drivers. and i wasn't saying have an attitude based on performance was a bad thing. I was making a stern german grin with the mad face after that.

that is why I bought the car. at the time when i was looking at the vehicle, I was wondering why porsche skimped on the other features. I began to understand that not only did they not skimp, but that their message was an exhilarating driving experience. I was simply relaying this to the forum.

I get 18-19 on the highway with the cruise on. in town... wouldn;t dream of breaking 11.5mpg. not even when it is new. I dont believe the EPA ratings, and the onboard computer clearly says around 10 in town.

Lastly, on the economy...

I removed all but breaking news from my life 2 months ago, and honestly have never felt better. I used to live with the CNN app buzzing my phone every other hour.

I have a large extended family polarized over two sides of life, one very fortunate 400-800k range, and the other very low middle class in terms of income, 18-30k range. I observe these two sides of life in america and it really puts my mind to work thinking about how the two worlds rarely ever cross. If you're an economist, and you're employed, that says to me someone is willing to pay a premium to have you around. You probably have a masters or other advanced degree, and you probably do well for yourself in all facets of life. Because of your position, you probably have worked hard and networked and if you were to come across a layoff situation, you'd be able to find something new in a short term time frame.

Since you are an economist, you know that the unemployment rate is sky high among two key demographics, recent college grads and those without a college degree. 9 months ago, I was lead photo editor for a very large fashion brand. Had a good life, was engaged to be married, and everything seemed to be going great. Through no fault of my own, I lost my job. I have spent every day for the last nine months searching for a new job. I have applied to over 1000 jobs. Like most college students, I bought into the growing economy in the mid 2000's, attended a great school and borrowed big to do so. Post College, I found a great career start, excelled at work and began to progress in life. Everything seemed to be going fine and then the rug comes right out from under you. Everyone in my family on the more fortunate side, the advanced degrees, the consultants, the MBA's, the lawyer, the government employee, they all think the economy is great... of course.. why wouldn't they? they are the ones blowing $250 every friday night for dinner, more money than some people in the midwest make in a week hauling scrap metal in a 25 year old ford.

flip the table to the other side, uncle loosing his home, cousins just graduated school (3) and can't a job. there are not many people entering the middle class anymore. there are those doing really well, those trying to just maintain their sinking status in middle class, and those trying not to default.


I lost the great job, Lost a great girl, and lost pretty much every possession I had worked for. Try selling your flatpanel just to keep your apartment, try going to a coffee shop to access the internet to apply for jobs, because you had to cancel cable. I refuse to ask my family for help, because (even though I am younger) I believe in something called accountability.

Its not good out there. The only job app replies I get from companies are, 1) you're over qualified and we need to pay a less experienced person less money. 2) you're 24. come back later.

To say there are plenty of jobs when the Gov reported general unemployment rate is 8.5% (double that for everyone who has fallen off of unemployment) just doesn't seem prudent to me. I have the will to bust my rear in the office, with a good degree, and fairly impressive resume for my age, but cannot even find an office to go bust it in. the porsche just went for sale on here, and this week, listing it on auto trader. It is the last thing to go, other than the furniture. I've only kept it because it is impossible to buy a new car without a job and impossible to get to an interview (should one ever actually arise) without the car.

If there is somewhere you know of there being "plenty of jobs" I'd love to know where that is, because I am a responsible person with a will to work hard and a 143 IQ.

 

and as a general rule, cole, I maintain that style and performance are NOT something people in this economy are willing to pay for. that statement of course doesn't apply to the wealthy. I am talking about the bulk of the population. the average american making 41.9k. they are driving honda odyessy busses and jeep commanders. I am talking about literally everyone else in my apt complex driving honda civics, scions, saturns, and fords.

none of that is style and performance. none of it.

these people can afford a porsche same as me in a literal sense. they COULD make the payment on their average salary if they REALLY wanted to. but they dont, because this economy isnt good enough yet that people are (generally speaking, the 41.9k'ers) that liberal with their money. someone with a porsche, as a general rule, is doing pretty damn well for themselves. Get out of NYC, DC, CHI, BOS, LA, MIAMI, and one will find that the streets aren't lined with X5's and Cayenne's but rather 97 ford explorers dripping conventional oil and sporting an autozone steering wheel covers and 02 saturn ions with curb rash and seat stains.

I have lived all over this country except for west of the rockies. And this has been my experience.

 

My $0.02 for you.

The "unemployment rate" is a "theory". It is not, and never will be a sole indicator of economic strength or weakness. It is simply one economic indicator in a sea of thousands! It happens to be one that is easy for the entertainment news media to tug at your heart strings with. That is probably its only real worth.

The simple truth is that the economy is ALWAYS different. Picking out one or two indicators and saying " last time we had X, Y happened" just doesn't work, but the news sure likes you to think so.

I prefer to think of the unemployment numbers in reverse. 92% of the people that want jobs have them! In all the schools I went to a 92% was an "A" not an "F"

Maybe we should look at the system and say that about 8% of the people that want jobs are no good at getting them. Maybe they are very skilled at their specific field, but not at job hunting. Or maybe the process itself has an 8% failure rate

Traditionally higher unemployment numbers have also typically been transitional periods in the economy. Periods where people reinvent themselves and how they earn an income. The invention of the chainsaw put a lot of lumberjacks with axes on the unemployment line. That is until they figured out how to make furniture, work at the new larger mill, etc

....and if the girl left you over something as silly as a temporary set back like a job....she was not a great girl

Just remember the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result

 

the girl left me not because I became unemployed, but because of the same reasons a good chunk of marriages and relationships fail, when finances becomes a point of stress and causes the relationship to slowly unwind in other (sometimes unrelated ways), all stacked together, cause a series of big bumps.

and yes 92% is an A. I agree.

I would add that the way i looked at it was, what should a great economy be able to support... say no better than 4.5% unemployment or so, and in that sense, I'd like to be part of that statistic that gets us there.

yes other people have told me that being in a very specific field makes it extremely difficult to find a new job, but what's done is done.

you seem like a good guy cole. best wishes.

 

Well said.. sounds like a few theories I would introduce to spark a social conversation.

 

Thank you!