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Mine is 13 years old, a Mitsubishi Spyder Eclipse GT, and I love it. It currently has about 52,000 miles on the clock, and has never once failed to start during

Mine is 13 years old, a Mitsubishi Spyder Eclipse GT, and I love it. It currently has about 52,000 miles on the clock, and has never once failed to start during the dozen or so times I’ve used it in the last year - unlike my wife’s much newer car which we keep on a battery charger now as a matter of course. These days, 260hp isn’t much of anything special, but back then it was the most powerful car I’d ever bought, and I still love the whine of the air, increasing in frequency, as I pull onto an empty freeway and put my foot down to get up to speed. Over the years it’s needed a small amount of maintenance - new tires, timing belts etc. But nothing has gone wrong that isn’t expected to happen on the maintenance schedule. That reliability and the fact that it’s been paid for, for over a decade now, is just awesome. Airbags everywhere, excellent brakes, not much rear visibility (but it’s a convertible, so the top is down more often than not), traction control, and a 6-cd changer [grin], what’s not to like :) Having said all that, in a few years it’ll be time to move to an electric car, but I want to stave off that future as long as possible.

Finnucane 5y ago
We have a 1999 Honda CRV with 66K miles on it (we bought it in 2007 with 48K miles on it). Insurance and maintenance cost us on average about $200/month. For the amount of driving we do, it just plain wouldn’t be worth spending more for a new car. We’re figuring when this car finally becomes too expensive to maintain, our next car will be no car, and we’ll just use rental/Zipcar/etc.
- lotsofpulp 5y ago
  I have a 2003 250k mile 4Runner, and my maintenance calculation is about $1,500 per 50k miles (tires, oil, filters, brakes incl labor). Which comes out to 3 cents per mile, fuel is at 25 cents per mile assuming $4/gal and 16 mpg. I max out liability only insurance at $45 per month for 5k miles per year, so let us round that to 1 cent per mile. So it comes out to 30 cents per mile plus my morbidity/mortality risk. Hard to justify a new car if I am happy with my current driving experience, which all I care about is CarPlay and air conditioning. I am hoping electric cars are fully tested and reliable by the time my car dies. Or someone steals it.

Finnucane 5y ago

We have a 1999 Honda CRV with 66K miles on it (we bought it in 2007 with 48K miles on it). Insurance and maintenance cost us on average about $200/month. For the amount of driving we do, it just plain wouldn’t be worth spending more for a new car. We’re figuring when this car finally becomes too expensive to maintain, our next car will be no car, and we’ll just use rental/Zipcar/etc.

lotsofpulp 5y ago
I have a 2003 250k mile 4Runner, and my maintenance calculation is about $1,500 per 50k miles (tires, oil, filters, brakes incl labor). Which comes out to 3 cents per mile, fuel is at 25 cents per mile assuming $4/gal and 16 mpg. I max out liability only insurance at $45 per month for 5k miles per year, so let us round that to 1 cent per mile. So it comes out to 30 cents per mile plus my morbidity/mortality risk. Hard to justify a new car if I am happy with my current driving experience, which all I care about is CarPlay and air conditioning. I am hoping electric cars are fully tested and reliable by the time my car dies. Or someone steals it.