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We are seeing more and more cars fitted with options, the average for a car run through our Spec Check service is over £2k and on prestige brands it's far higher than that. The average Porsche Cayenne has almost £10k of extras fitted at the factory, and I've seen them over £22k, of course this means if you buy one which 'only' has 20" wheels and regular leather seats it might look good in isolation, but when most of the others have 21" rims and higher grade leather it's not going to be easy to sell. It's also not helped by manufacturers trying to reduce build costs by fitting the same audio systems/switch panels to all models, irrespective of what is actually on the car. I was driving a new Rav-4 last week but pushing the 'Nav' button on the dashboard brought up the message 'system not installed' on the screen, and I know the F10 5 series is the same with the button being there even when the system isn't fitted. My last 3 series (a 2010 325d) had a phone button but no Bluetooth, which I was monumentally annoyed about! Even Ford are getting in on the option pack act with city packs, convenience packs, media packs and so on, all for a few hundred quid a pop when new. Then there's Mercedes with Artico interiors, I could go on for hours....

The options debate is one that is certainly very important and very subjective, as we all know. the point James makes reference the AWD and 2WD, is something I have highlighted previously, and I am sure that there are many drivers out there that bought the vehicle under the assumption it was AWD (I wonder whether the salesman knew?). With regards the factory fitted options, the second issue is, if there is a value associated and would you have one option without the other. We discussed recently the options that are relative to safety, which if they were highlighted better, I'm confident that the consumers would understand the value. Both the Mini and now the Adam are probably the worst culprits and not far behind are vehicles such as the Fiat 500 etc.