Running costs
Road tax, insurance, servicing, and the repair bills that arrive later.
Continental versus Japanese, the running cost gap nobody prices in
A five year old BMW and a five year old Toyota can sit at similar prices on the listing page. Over the next five years of ownership they will not cost anything close to the same, and the difference is bigger than most buyers expect.
What a used car actually costs to run for a year
Depreciation and the monthly instalment get all the attention. Everything else adds up to somewhere between six and fifteen thousand a year depending on the car, and most buyers only discover the number after they have committed.