i think like cupcake says its a fact of life that a car will always lose some value when a new model is released. TBH there aint many cars that your gonna make money on, unless your lucky and get one of the first minis off the production line for example, and sell it straight away. UK suffers from its own success in a way, market is flooded with 172's/182's etc,lots of competion drives prices down. Here in holland there is no market for hot hatches, if u ebay search Clio RS/172 /cliosport here in holland you dont find one used 172 for sale, and they never sold cups. Even that doesn't effect used value that much, only thing that keeps second hand values high is brand and build. I just went and got quotes for Focus RS, Megane 225 and Golf Gti, despite being 4,000 quid more expensive than the Ford and renault, the lease price i was offered was 100 euros a month cheaper on the golf.