Motoring Down The Cost of Your Holiday Home

While the falling the value of sterling has severely increased the cost of motoring holidays across the Eurozone, the difference in the price of leaded and unleaded fuel on the continent varies quite markedly in the Eurozone. So if you are planning a motoring holiday overseas or think driving down to your holiday home may work out more cost effective than flying, where’s the best place to make your pitstop enroute?

In a recent Post Office Motoring on the Continent survey, Switzerland was the cheapest for unleaded fuel for the second year running (significant for a country which puts eco-friendly issues at the top of its agenda) and is now the only European motoring holiday market with unleaded fuel under £1 a litre. However it is the UK’s old favourite Spain which tops the list when taking all aspects of motoring into account.

The cost of unleaded petrol (at the equivalent of around £1 a litre) is the cheapest in the Eurozone and when taken into consideration together with the value for money hire services available in the country, Spain is the cheapest market for those from the UK considering a motoring holiday especially if the family air travel bill is looking costly. The impact on holiday home owners is also significant making it more cost effective in some cases to drive down to your holiday home rather than fly with the added saving of car hire at your final desitnation. This all reflects very poorly on the UK where the double whammy of rising oil prices around the world and the falling value of sterling has hit domestic holidaymakers very hard.

It is also interesting to see that on the continent the price of petrol and diesel is still around the same level, where as in the UK and Sweden the price of diesel can be between 13p and 16p a litre more than the price of petrol. Quite how this gap has opened substantially has mystified many in the UK but it shows the gap between the UK and the rest of Europe and its this widening gap in the cost of living in the UK compared to Europe which continues to be a major factor prompting more and more people to consider a emigrating to a new life abroad.

Motoring holidays continue to be popular with UK holiday makers with the opportunity to see more than just same old resorts. Those with holiday homes on the contient, driving down also saves on car hire costs locally, avoids those pesky baggage limits and adds interest during the journey down, with the chance to travel through more traditional areas of Spain and the like.