Used Porsche 911 Cabriolet 2005 - 2012 review

High-mileage Porsche 997 Cabriolets are down to the £20,000 mark, or for £25,000 you can pick up an early Gen 1 car with about 70,000 miles on the clock. Manuals are more popular than the early Tiptronics and the Carrera S is favoured over the Carrera, all of which is reflected in prices. Gen 2 cars start at £35,000 for a car that’s covered about 90,000 miles, while £40,000 opens up the door to a lot of 911s with good histories and sensible mileages.

For a GTS you’ll need to spend at least £60,000 but with these holding their value well you could stand to lose less in depreciation in the longer term. 911 Turbos cost from about £54,000 for an early one, rising to close to £100,000 for a late, low-mileage Turbo S.

Buying an Approved Used car from a Porsche main dealer will cost you more, but don’t rule it out entirely as doing so also gets you a two-year, manufacturer-backed warranty.

A gently driven 997 Cabriolet can return as much as 30mpg, which is impressive when you consider its performance potential, as is the fact that a set of tyres can be stretched to 20,000 miles or so. However, start to enjoy having all that power under your right foot and you can soon see yourself with fuel economy in early-20s, as well as wearing through tyres at an increased rate.

Insurance and road tax aren’t cheap; expect to pay at least £300 per year for the latter, and that’s if you have an early Carrera. Later models come in at more than £500 per year.

That service intervals are every two years or 20,000 miles might sound like it’ll ease the financial burden, but in reality each service can potentially run into a four-figure bill if a couple of extra bits need doing above and beyond what’s normal. A replacement clutch alone is about £500, for example, and with these tending to last for about 50,000 miles there will be a lot of cars on the used market that need the work doing.

One way to save money is to find a good Porsche specialist to maintain your car rather than using the official dealer network.