DCist

I never thought I would say this to you K-A, but this post actually makes you look good :-)

Nonetheless, please do remember how much you dogged W212 and promised that all hell will break loose when the new 5er would appear :-)

K-A

Of course I remember, it only adds to my twisted and historic personal car-enthusiast experience with the W212.

LaicepsYdobon

It's a Love/Hate thing I'm was in the same boat also. Wasn't too crazy about the new E but I must say that the exterior grew on me. I actually like it much better than the new 5-er. Interiorwise the 5 wins for me.

Interesting thing about the new 5. A lot of BMW faithful seem a bit disappointed with it. One of my friend's father has been a BMW devotee for the past 10+ years. Last week he came over to my house driving the new Infinity M. He tried the new 5 and he said it felt bloated and could not live with it. He tried getting an E550 but he could not get a deal so he went with the new Infinity instead. He said it doesn't drive like the BMW but he'll drive that until he can get a descent price on the E550.

K-A

True true. It's been an interesting experience for me, I've learned a lot, and I can say the W212 will always be a historic car to me, which sparked major emotions from both ends of the spectrum, for whatever reasons. I think that makes the ownership experience very unique and interesting to me.

Yeah, some seem very "dull" in their reaction of the F10.

I dunno, I love it, and think aside from the front, it's a gorgeous car, even if it doesn't win me over enough to have wanted one. I notice a lot of Enthusiast sectors are really showing support for the direction of the design, as it's a respectable approach. But no doubt, I think in general, and especially the masses, will find the W212 to have more "Curb Appeal". Just a flip from the W211 and E60 Generation.

220S

That's a major problem, the residuals on MBs are at the very bottom (second to last.) MBs are not a very good value unfortunately. That also keeps a certain demographic away from them. MBUSA is trying to correct that with lots of advertising, but the market just won't bear them out on this issue. It's really unfortunate the depreciation is among the worst in the industry. It used to not be like that with MBs. If you lease today all you're doing is paying off the depreciation for them, and then they can resell the car. If you buy, you'll have to keep the car for many years until it levels out. It's a no win.

(And yes, I realize it's happening with many segments of the industry due to the economy, but if you check the ALG charts, MB is worse than everybody else in the segment. And if you go back all the way to 2001, BMW has beat out MB each year. Land Rover was even better in 2009 )

petee1997

220S you are right. However I notice MB is making an effort to merchandise their used cars. Dealer cost on CPO is way down. They are financing used cars as low as 1.9%. According to my dealer this is working. Dealers are buying more of their lease returns and making money.
Keep in mind BMW took a 800M bath on their lease fleet about 18 months ago because residuals were too high. They are now correcting this.

In Canada YTD, MB is #1 in premium cars,#2 BMW, #3 Acura. Overall market leader is Ford, yes you read this right, Ford is #1.

Finally my point is, MB is getting their act together. They took their eye off the ball during the Chrysler experiment. I would expect resale values to go up as the quality improves.

kl07rph

petee1997, spot on w/ BMW and their lease debacle. One could have gotten crazy deals back then...seemed like everyone was leasing a 750Li, 550i, etc. However, MB was better positioned for the impending doom aka "economic downturn;" and given their new approach to quality, residuals/resale will climb way back up.

For now, the lower resale values makes picking up a used/low-mileage vehicle a good deal. It's actually making me think about an '04-06 E55...now if only the wife agreed

K-A

I'm not too savvy on residuals, etc. but I do know that they, and of course resale values of cars depend usually on one determining factor: Reliability.

M-B's Reliability went in the tank, and they stopped covering the Service costs, and people fled to Lexus, BMW, etc. My Mom and about everyone she knows was one of them. She gave up her W211 and went into a E60 against her will, due only to the Free Servicing, and her distrust in the M-B Reliability.

As the Reliability gets better, the resale will go up. Case in point is how much better the first year W221 is holding up better than the first year W220, etc. Also, the W204 C-Class has been rock solid in the Used Market, holding very strong values (combating the W211 of the same year in some cases), due to its strong Sales, and backing it up with strong dependability (relatively speaking at least).

The W211 for example ended up as a Reliable and solid car, but those first 2-3 years just put an axe in the cars overall running resale values.

M-B has tried to make a "physic" style point with the W212 when they announced that it "Has The Best ReSale Value In Its Class" before it ever went on Sale (LOL), which of course is part of their marketing "Fix".

I think the W212 should hold a decent value, all things considered, i.e be like a proper higher level of what the W204 has done, and similar to how the W221 has done, etc. Of course it'll be a popular Car and seller like all E-Classes, and if it backs it up with a no-horror-stories legacy, maybe the Residual factor will start coming around.

BTW, my Residual is about $32K. For a car that is just over 3 years old, I don't think that is very bad at all? I'm sure many CPO 10's would be going for more than that, if the W212 holds its value decently (which I'm sure it will for the reasons I mentioned).

Where I personally got screwed, is that I bought a '10 right before the '11's drop, and I'm sure my Residual doesn't reflect that, i.e my car will only literally be 3 years old, but the MY will show it'll be 4 years old, and I'll have to eat that extra year of depreciation/Residual factor.

MBNUT1

Quite true.

220S

Yeah, you're both correct about BMW getting hit with the residual game when the economy hit the skids. They ended up with a big disparity in their contract residuals and the actual used value. But even in 2009, "Daimler has underperformed its nearest competitor Bayerische Motoren Werke AG, the No. 1 luxury carmaker. Daimler’s shares have fallen 20 percent this year, while BMW rose 1.7 percent."

And 2010 still looks gloomy for all of them: http://www.autoremarketing.com/ar/ne...ss+Per+Vehicle

As Petee says, MB dealers are able to resell CPO cars at a better price now, and that will help with depreciation. But MB is still at over 40%. Whether better quality helps or not will have to be seen since that's a somewhat subjective perceived sort of thing in respect to the buying public. But it certainly doesn't hurt.

Even with the industry following ALG predictions, there are always things that can have an affect on residual pricing. War, natural disasters, public's perception on the price of oil, meteors crashing to earth, Zombies invading Edmonton, etc., etc..

For sure BMW got stung in the residuals prediction game. MB was better positioned partly because they received a big cash infusion in 2009 by selling 9.1% of Daimler's shares to Aabar Investments (owned by the state run oil company of Abu Dhabi.) The Saudis helped out a lot with that cash ($2.7 billion): “It’s an attractive price for Abu Dhabi, and it’s good for Daimler to raise cash and get a long-term investor, because the next two years will be very hard.”

And Kuwait increased its stake to almost 7% of Daimler just this spring. BMW is still owned primarily by the Quandt family (the majority shareholders.)

fwiw, here's the current 2010 ALG residual rankings (highest is best):

Mainstream Brand Residual Value Rankings

1. SUBARU
2. HONDA
3. MAZDA
4. NISSAN
5. TOYOTA
6. VOLKSWAGEN
7. SUZUKI
8. HYUNDAI
9. FORD

Luxury Brand Residual Value Rankings

1. ACURA
2. LEXUS
3. AUDI
4. INFINITI
5. LAND ROVER
6. BMW
7. MERCEDES BENZ
8. PORSCHE

petee1997

I read last week that Mercedes Benz had the best June in their history worldwide. They are doing something right. In Canada, their numbers have doubled over the last four years. The brand is attracting new customers and a lot of people like myself who had migraded to other makes, are coming back. Reliability and brand are the cement that creates strong resale values.

PGT

+1. I'm a new M-B owner and the latest products are compelling and I'm a performance minded gearhead.

K-A

M-B Sales are definitely way up this year, compared to their horrid '09, and if I'm not mistaken, they are over BMW right now Sales-wise, which hasn't happened in several years.

Right now all the positives in that regard are just damage controlling what damage they've endured in the past several years.

I think the main reasons their Sales are up are because of A- Economy's free-fall let up a bit, and B- The new E-Class came out, and slaughtered the last year 5-Series. As we all know, consumers, especially Luxo Consumers, love a new body style, and with M-B Launching pretty much countless new models in the coming years, they should see benefits from them in the next several years, until those models are waiting to be replaced, etc.

220S

Here are the June figures.

btw, reliability is only one part of the residual equation. Porsche is lowest on residuals yet higher on reliability. The issue is that Porsche is more of a niche product. As ALG makes clear, residuals are based on many different parameters, with reliability being only one of them. Consumer perception is the main force. All manufacturers prescribe to ALG's predictions, but even they admit it's not scientific and all sorts of factors enter into it.

fwiw, MB has been launching a big "reliability is back"" campaign with the auto press. We'll see if it works. And in several years we'll see if it's actually true. Let's hope so.

petee1997

220S I assume those numbers are for the US. I don't remember the exact sales figures for June but it was somewhere in the 120,000 units worldwide. Europe was their biggest market with the US second. China, of course was their fastest growing market.

220S

Yes, those are US figures, up 20.5%. Western Europe was down though, by 3.6%.

Here are the June worldwide figures for Mercedes and with emerging market numbers (Brazil, Russia, India.)

US: +20.5%
China: +177%
Japan: +26.5%
Brazil, Russia, India: +70%
Western Europe: -3.6%

All of 2010 first 6 months (worldwide): 15.2%

K-A

Looks like Sales of the 5-Series has it getting closer to being hot on the heels of the E-Class with the F10 release.

petee1997

220S I'm always impressed with your research and presentation of facts. You must have written a few dissertations while in university. It also explains why I always ended up sucking a hind teat in any of my disagreements with you.

OceanView

I'm a bit surprised by the Hyundai Genesis making it in the top 5.
I haven't driven one but I wonder how it compares to the competition.

220S

LOL. Yeah, it's from many years of a very bad habit. After I received my doctorate (only one dissertation required for that thankfully ), I taught at two universities. Life becomes nothing but ideas and research and the dialectic. While still young and dumb, I ran away from the academy. It had gotten kind of stale for me. So I went and got my MFA degree and now work in the film industry. But I still have those awful habits of ideas, research, and ratiocination.


p.s., being in academia doesn't mean one is necessarily smart. It only guarantees a weird sort of tenacity. I'm living proof of that, LOL.

K-A

It's a good car, and really gives some of the competition a good run, whilst costing a lot less.

When I drove it back to back with an S-Class, it occurred to me that the car very much is in some ways, and is obviously intended as a "Poor Man's S-Class", which is a compliment to it actually.

MBNUT1

So KA listen to this. Guess what my buddy at work whom I bought my E350 from and who later bought an 08 E350 and this week just bought a 2010 E350 said about the W212? He first commented on it's steering being much more responsive and then went on to say that the quality of the interior materials was not as good as the W211 "the hard dash material is more like the C Class" totally unsolicited on my part.

MBNUT1

220S no insult to you because you are obviously a smart guy but I have definitely found that to be true of a large number of PHD's that I have worked with. One of them describes it as having an iron butt.

DerekACS

Sorry, but I would disagree with your buddy. My wife has a 2008 C350 Sport; the interior quality of the C Class does not come close to the W212.

mg-E550

to the original poster - well written and thanks for doing it. Iwas in same boat as you...looking at these pictures I definitely think the 212 is a better looking in the front. I thought the 212's rear would look dumb next to a F10 but your pics show otherwise.

I hate to say it - I think the E60 (at least the M5) looks better from the front than the F10.