JOHANNESBURG - Order books for the new Volkswagen Golf 8 GTI are open, with an official market launch scheduled for the start of September 2021. Pricing, before any extras, is listed as R669 300. But, what if you crave the Golf GTI experience but can’t quite stretch to (or indeed justify spending) nearly R700 000?
Well, there are thankfully plenty of options on the used market. In fact, Wolfsburg’s legendary front-driven hot hatch was again the most searched for variant in the first six months of the year, according to the 2021 AutoTrader Mid-Year Industry Report.
“The GTI badge is immensely popular with South African consumers, with over 1.6 million searches conducted for this variant alone in the first half of the year,” points out AutoTrader’s CEO George Mienie.
For the record, we’re taking a look at average prices and mileage per registration year going back to 2005, when the Golf 5 GTI first hit the market in South Africa.
That fifth-generation version of the GTI remained on sale locally until mid-2009. The average mileage for 2007 models is relatively high at more than 180 000km, which sees the average price fall to around R130 000 (interestingly some R15 000 less than older 2006 models).
There’s a significant R42 000 or a whopping 27 percent jump in average price to around R200 000 for the 2010 registration-year GTI (with the Golf 6 GTI having made its debut the previous year), with 2011 versions featuring both higher average mileage and more affordable average pricing. Another spike in median pricing is seen for 2012.
The Golf 7 GTI made local landfall towards the middle of that year, with this factor likely explaining the R42 000 jump in average price (to about R255 000) from the preceding year. Intriguingly, a further 14 percent hike is seen for 2014.
The Performance Pack option was added to the Golf GTI range in 2015, where the average price creeps past the R300 000 mark. For the 2016 registration year, average mileage dips into five figures while average pricing climbs to more than R341 000.
Golf GTI models registered in 2017 experienced a R64 000 leap in average pricing, partly explained by the launch of the facelifted Golf 7 GTI (also known as the 7.5).
The average price difference compared with the previous registration year predictably climbs towards the end of the Golf 7 GTI’s lifespan. In fact, the figure in 2021 comes in at a hefty R679 000, or about R10 000 more than the base price of the new Golf 8 GTI.
“If you shop in the 2015 to 2016 bracket, you can pick up a Golf GTI for around half the price of the new one, with average mileage coming in at a palatable 100 000km,” concludes Mienie.
Here are the used VW Golf GTIs on sale on AutoTrader and what you can expect to pay versus age, model and mileage:
