Inquiring as to the perceived desirability of the five speed manual transmission in Jaguar purchase/ownership decisions. Is this a possible value-added feature or something to be avoided by the average person? Should it affect resale value or make little difference (all other aspects considered equal)? NADA, for example, docks it a few hundred. It has, for me, been one of the best features of S Type ownership and has performed flawlessly for the life of the car (oh, there I've gone and done it now....).

 

The dealer I worked for sold only a handful of manual gearbox Jaguars over the years I was there.

The base price was less for that and few people ordered them.

bob

 

Apparently the average age of a new-car Jaguar customer is in the fifties/early sixties depending on geography. Most wanted the ease of an automatic, but even BMW sells more automatic 5 Series cars than manuals, also by quite some way.

However, I wouldn't swap my manual S-Type for an automatic. In the long term, if the car remains in very good condition, the manuals may be worth more as they become very rare and one or two people still want one.

 

Thanks. Yes, no grey area on this it seems - you're either the small handful of folks who only want one or the thousands+ who definitely don't. I was 39 when I bought mine new and, admittedly, pretended not to want the manual in order to talk the price down.

Funny, on the next drive immediately after typing the last line in my post, my check engine light came on. Do not provoke the universe! Fortunately the code is a downstream O2 sensor, fairly easily rectified...

 

Mine is a one-owner car too and I bought mine when I was almost 38 and it has just under 60k miles

It is waiting for some free time from me for a service, new brake hoses, handbrake cables, etc. to put it back into tip top shape. Even the rear parking sensors are currently working!