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You gotta be rich to own a cheap car

149 points by passive 12y ago

rhino369 12y ago
I found this piece to be pretty much garbage. OMG only rich people can get a ride from their wife!!!! The article should have been: You gotta be a mechanic to own a cheap luxury/sports car.
- freehunter 12y ago
  You have to be good at repairing cars, but probably not an actual mechanic. An actual mechanic may not make enough to afford the parts. I had a truck that was less than reliable in the past. I had all the know-how and tools to fix everything myself, and even had the money to buy the parts. But I shed a single tear and then traded it in for a newer, more reliable car because, while I was making good money, I had been sitting in my driveway at 8:05am still trying to crank the engine over a few times too many. My boss wanted me there at 8, not 9:15 when I was able to get a ride from someone else. And that's half the point of the article. If your job demands you be there on time, you can't own a clunker even if you can afford to fix it and know how to fix it.
  - steverb 12y ago
    My personal solution has been to own two clunkers, but my wife says it's a personal sickness on my part (I like clunkers). I blame the fact that while I am not personally a redneck, I am descended from a very long line of rednecks and can't remember a time when we didn't own at least one car that didn't run. And that's not even counting the beloved "donor" cars. :-)
    - wernercd 12y ago
      As long as one (or more) of those clunkers isn't hiding under un-mowed grass and surrounded by broken garden gnomes :)
    - KingMob 12y ago
      Just think of it as "cloud transporting". One automobile instance goes down, fail back to another. You could start a new business like... maybe EngineYard? :)
      - jethro_tell 12y ago
        Ha, for a Minute I forgot that I was on HN.
      - lafar6502 12y ago
        You not only have HA cluster, you can also do some load-balancing - this way you have two cars with 30k miles on each instead of just one car with 60k :) Just basic math - which one setup will depreciate faster?
      - steverb 12y ago
        That is almost exactly how I view it. I can buy two super cheap cars for less than one very reliable one, and when it's something that I can't fix cheaply or quickly enough I sell off the car and go buy another. I also stick to the one pay check rule for cars, in that no car I buy should cost more than one paycheck, although I did make an exception for the van we use to haul the younguns around in.
    - freehunter 12y ago
      My solution was to buy another clunker when I was in the financial position to be able to afford having two cars. It hasn't stopped running yet, the real challenge will be convincing the wife to let me keep it after it does stop running. There's something relaxing about spending a weekend under a truck, putting it all back together, and driving it around knowing it's only alive because you saved it.
  - driverdan 12y ago
    > An actual mechanic may not make enough to afford the parts. What? You realize mechanics can make good money right? Most shops charge $100+/h.
    - freehunter 12y ago
      What shops charge and what mechanics get is two different things. My company charges $100+/h for my time, but I make far less than that. Two friends who work as mechanics make $20/hr (senior-level) and $8/hr (junior level). Mechanics can make good money, just like programmers can make good money. But there are an awful lot of programmers out there making comparatively nothing.
- steverb 12y ago
  I did not get that from the article at all. Just that there are certain costs to owning a used car that you don't usually incur when owning a new one. I thought the author was acknowledging that he was better equipped to deal with those costs than someone else might be in a different life situation. And for those other people, it might actually make more sense for them to own a newer car even if it might appear at first blush that they were being less responsible with their money than we might think they should be. In other words, there's no such thing as a free lunch.
  - mikeash 12y ago
    The article needs a new title. "You gotta be rich to own a car with almost a million miles on it" would be much better. Of course, this is a pretty obvious thing to say, so it probably wouldn't get as many clicks. But at least it would be honest. It makes no sense to talk about costs of "owning a used car." The costs involved in owning a two-year-old midrange Toyota with 20,000 miles on it are completely different from the costs involved in owning an ancient luxury car that's driven the equivalent of to the Moon and back twice. Buying a Lexus with 900,000 miles on it is so unusual that there's no way to generalize the story beyond it.
    - sejje 12y ago
      I'm not sure what it read when you wrote this comment, but it currently reads "to own a cheap car." Used is implied, certainly, but I don't think "barely used" is part of it. Basically, a two-year-old Toyota with 20k miles doesn't qualify.
      - mikeash 12y ago
        Which "it"? The comment I'm replying to says, "Just that there are certain costs to owning a used car that you don't usually incur when owning a new one." In any case, there's a wide universe of cheap cars (and what exactly is the threshold for "cheap" anyway?) just as there is a wide universe of used cars.
  - maxlybbert 12y ago
- wernercd 12y ago
  It was more than just "being a mechanic". It's * being a mechanic (so you don't have to pay $500 for a $200 job). * having a job with flexible hours (This happens on the way to McJob and your late? McBye Bye.) * having someone else dependable with a flexible job (Friday night and everyone know you know is working at McJobs?) * having someone to take care of your kids so the kid is at home/daycare/babysitters and not freezing in your car * having spare money so the choice isn't food vs radiator * being able to easily adjust to different circumstances. Not everyone can lose a car and adjust with minimal effort. car breaks down and you expect McJob holder to be able to afford another car? thousand(s) for fix? downpayment on a replacment in short order? All of this revolves around the fact that he's in a good place, and able to count his blessings. If all you got out of this is "you gotta be a mechanic" then you need to re-read it.
  - jerf 12y ago
    “The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money. "Take boots, for example. He earned thirty-eight dollars a month plus allowances. A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about ten dollars. Those were the kind of boots Vimes always bought, and wore until the soles were so thin that he could tell where he was in Ankh-Morpork on a foggy night by the feel of the cobbles. "But the thing was that good boots lasted for years and years. A man who could afford fifty dollars had a pair of boots that'd still be keeping his feet dry in ten years' time, while the poor man who could only afford cheap boots would have spent a hundred dollars on boots in the same time and would still have wet feet. "This was the Captain Samuel Vimes 'Boots' theory of socioeconomic unfairness.” - Terry Pratchett, Men At Arms: The Play http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/72745-the-reason-that-the-rich-were-so-rich-vimes-reasoned http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/72745-the-reason-that-the-ri...
    - nowarninglabel 12y ago
      This is a good point, and why it usually be framed in a different way, that some people get rich by being very value-oriented. It's about getting the best bang for the buck.
- tdicola 12y ago
  Not to mention there's a huge difference between a used car with 890k! miles vs. a used car with closer to 70-100k miles. Sure that Lexus is a well built Toyota with good reliability, but at that mileage you're going to be expecting things to break. On the other hand if you get a less than 10 year old car with under 100k miles, unless it's known to have major issues, you shouldn't have nearly the amount of problems.
normloman 12y ago
I come from a poor family, and I'm no rich guy now. My family has always owned used cars. My current used car has saved me a ton of money, and as long as I maintain it, it will last a very long time. And by no means am I some great mechanic. I know how to change the filters, I get jiffy lube to change my oil, and thats it. So buying a used car can make a lot of sense. Of course, I'm not buying a used Maserati. That's just stupid.
- freehunter 12y ago
  He didn't write about buying used card. In fact, he even made a point about buying not-that-old Civics, because there is no risk to owning a used Civic. But changing your oil and filters won't help you when the CV joint snaps going down the road (and it's going to happen someday), or when the alternator seizes up, or when the starter won't turn over, or when the timing belt snaps without warning. All of those things can happen on an older vehicle without a moment's notice, and besides the timing belt, none of them are commonly found on a scheduled maintenance calendar. Changing your oil only helps until that odometer rolls over 250k (for a reliable car) or even 90k (for a cheap econobox). The point isn't "don't buy a used car", it's "don't listen to articles saying you should buy a car with a million miles for $1000".
  - normloman 12y ago
    I read the article. He mentioned the civic thing once, and didn't explicitly recommend buying used civics. It wasn't mentioned in the title either. So I wanted to comment here, just in case anyone got the wrong idea that used cars are expensive.
  - jacquesm 12y ago
    CV joints 'snap' when they have been left without lube or have been driven way past their lifespan (normally the life of the vehicle but for smaller cars they are fragile enough that it is not rare to see them go). One major reason for CV joint problems is the CV joint boot tearing allowing road grime in and grease out of the joint (they warm up enough that the lube becomes fluid and of course there is all the swirling which will happily empty a fully greased up CV joint in a few hundred kilometers). So you inspect those periodically and replace them when they have a large enough number of miles on them. Maintenance is everything with things that you use every day and that you depend on. It's like technical debt in software: you can ignore it for a bit but then you end up paying double or worse. A CV joint is a wear part itself too, so if it has done its duty you replace it. (Not all that hard, but definitely not 'can barely replace a tire' territory.)
jkot 12y ago
That is how you make money on internet. Car broke down? Dress it up and write an article. In next level write about someone sooo rich, he does not even own the car.
- m52go 12y ago
  What are you referring to? Tavarish's blog is gold. Baruth's post is thoughtful commentary and reflection. None of it is click-bait.
  - jkot 12y ago
    I just don't get this guy. He is trying to thoughtfully mock some reflection, but it just show him as an alien from different planet. Yes, there are people who have to rely on $500 cars. Yes, cars sometimes broke down, people have to walk, freeze whatever. And yes, you should do maintenance even on cheap used cars. And yes, if you buy junk you should probably change some critical parts. And no, it is not a privilege to own this sort of car.
- spacecadet 12y ago
  Actually yes. During college;a friend of mine and I would purchase broken-used-sports-cars on craigslist, repair them in a garage we rented and resell them. I owned some sweet cars for as little as weeks at a time, made some loot(a little) and I learned a shit ton about fixing cars.
Zigurd 12y ago
Meh. Older luxury cars can be great cheap cars for the kids, as long as you avoid extreme high mileage, known expensive parts issues, and dubious service records. CARFAX is useful: You get to see service records. I would pick a 10-15 year old Benz with 100k miles (where the prices come down quickly) that's been dealer-serviced, over a Subaru or Volvo. Any decent car should go 200k miles before it becomes a money sink, and Lexus, BMW, and Benz engines should run to 300k miles before anything expensive wears out. Automatic transmissions and rev-limiters make it hard to destroy an engine through abuse. Non-turbo 6 and 8 cylinder luxury car engines have led an easy life. The cars they are talking about are either semi-exotic high performance models that probably have been whipped, or super-high-mileage. That's called having a hobby.
- AmVess 12y ago
  Used German cars are among the biggest money sinks on the planet aside from unaffordable exotics. Out of dozens of friends and dozens and dozens of Euro cars, not a single person has had an inexpensive to repair or own BMW/Mercedes/Audi/SAAB...new or used. And these are cared for vehicles, not rolling wrecks or the result of careless owners. My 95k Ford had 1 repair in the years that I owned it (a rarity for Ford)...a thermostat. My 70k miles Honda has had $0 in repairs since 2006. German luxury cars only make sense if leased from new (which 70% of them are). Used? Run far away, and run fast.
  - sejje 12y ago
    I've owned several fords that all held up well: 1989 Ford Taurus: $450 car, required new battery terminals. Totaled it out fairly quickly--side note: head on collision at approx 45mph with no seat belt, walked away with scratches. Given 3300 by insurance people for the car only. 199X Ford Escort Hatchback: $500 car, zero maintenance over a couple of years. Eventually started stalling in neutral unless you revved it, I sold it to my sister for $200 and bought something else. Vaccuum hose had a hole, $4 fix. 1987 Ford Mustang: $3500 car, required a clutch immediately for $800. Drove for several years with no further mechanical problems (though it did have body issues), sold it for $2250. The decrease in value was almost wholly my own fault in causing & then neglecting the body issues. I had one lemon, but not a Ford. A 199x Pontiac Grand Am. $850 car, immediately needed tires & a water pump (making it a $1200 car). Broke down approximately 15 times for various reasons, mostly small problems or problems I learned to live with. I eventually got a noticed it would be towed if not moved from where I had it parked, and I decided it was prudent to let it be towed. Otherwise: 1996 Nissan Pickup: $3k car in 2009, still own it, has had zero repairs. Several things have failed: A/C, both front blinkers fell out of the truck, someone backed into the front bumper and misaligned the headlights, broken into & stereo & speakers stolen. Engine is otherwise perfect, though. I'm trying to sell it now, as I bought a Jeep Cherokee about a month ago. I would be incredibly surprised if I can't get $1500 for it, but I have someone coming to look this weekend at $2400 asking price. Maybe I've been lucky, but the total amount of repair fees I've paid over all of these, including the lemon, is somewhere around $3k I'd guess, vehicles overall costing me a couple thousand for the last 15 years of vehicles, usually with redundancy by owning 2 at a time. I own a motorcycle now, as well, so I have three levels. I did the easiest repairs myself. If I couldn't learn it in 20 minutes on youtube, I paid someone else.
lumberjack 12y ago
No you don't. New Toyota corolla: $16,000 2005 Toyota corolla: $4,000 I don't think there exists a scenario where you can end up outspending the MSRP if you buy a used previous model. Say for example your absolute lemon has chassis damage and needs to be scrapped (that's the absolute worst scenario). You still have $12,000 with which to buy another used car. Say you spend a whole week working on it to fix something catastrophic. I don't think anything would take that long but anyway. How many people actually make $12,000 in a week? Not many that need to save money on cars.
- dangerlibrary 12y ago
  It's almost like you didn't read the article to discover that his point was only tangentially related to the headline.
  - mahranch 12y ago
    Bingo. It's pretty common for people to comment without reading the link on sites like reddit, but that was never the case here. Until recently, that is. They see the title, then head right to the comment section to give their "superior" opinion.
    - freehunter 12y ago
      When I came in here, there were three top-level comments and all of them were variations on "I drive a late-model used version of a reliable car with relatively low miles and it's never broken down!" I would say more than half of the people commenting here either did not read or did not absorb the message of the article.
    - zo1 12y ago
      I don't see it that way. As long as the posting itself causes discussion to occur, then that's great. If that happens because of the title, rather than the content then so be it. Additionally, I'm mostly participating and reading the comments here because of the general topic of new vs used cars. The content, at least in this case, is irrelevant to me.
andkon 12y ago
There's a reason that I have always loved reading TTAC and will always continue to read it. These guys are thoughtful and interesting to a degree that is only rivalled by how insular and myopic most car people are. They taught teenaged me a lot of lessons about critical thinking by laying it on top of one of my favourite topics - cars. Enough of a love letter - I agree with the point. There's a similar thing that happens with house owners: owning a whole bunch of tools and being able to fix your own stuff is a privilege that middle class people enjoy, but poor people do not. You have to pay for the ability to plan for contingencies, and if you can barely afford to pay for your living expenses, you definitely can't afford to pay for the $50 battery charger, or the $30 socket set, or the time and energy required to learn all this stuff in the first place and put it into action when you need it done.
- gaius 12y ago
  It's the same with the tastefully minimalist lifestyle - being able to say "I'll just buy (another) one of those if I need it" and throwing something perfectly good out, is a privilege of the rich. It takes money to own very little.
- sukilot 12y ago
  Many cities have Tool Libraries and Lendof Libraries. They are wonderful.
IshKebab 12y ago
This lead me to: http://www.fancyparking.com/ http://www.fancyparking.com/
- freehunter 12y ago
  Is it just pictures of people who backed into a parking spot? The gallery requires Flash, so I haven't seen it. There are actually some places around here that have signs explicitly disallowing backing into a parking space for one reason or another. Anyway, I was taught in drivers training (in the US) that if you are able to pull through a parking space so the front of your car is parked towards the road, you should. Not sure how common that message is.
  - jethro_tell 12y ago
    I worked on farms as a kid. We expressly didn't allow backing up in farm trucks. To the point where that part of the transmission was removed on most big farm trucks and we were told to park in a way that allowed only going forward. Pretty easy when you spend most of your time parking in giant fields, but even now in my city life I try to avoid the risk of driving backwards.
    - bmelton 12y ago
      I generally prefer to either "pull through" into a spot so that I can "leave forward" or, if the lot is full enough, back into a spot... logic being that I either have to back in to the spot or out of the spot, and backing into the spot is slightly more controlled (given the minimal foot traffic into a spot) compared to the challenge of backing out of a spot into the lanes where people/children/etc are walking. I can't imagine a reason you wouldn't be able to do the same in a farm truck, except for the sometimes when it's towing something. Care to expound?
      - jethro_tell 12y ago
        Sure, in the parking lot, you are choosing between backing in or backing out. I find backing in to be the better option for two reasons. The first being that you can drive by and see who/what is in the spot. Second, like you said, the access to the spot is better controlled. In the farm case, you can always drive forward. It was part of the engineering of the workflow for that operation; for every operation, there is a forward path to completion. You don't have to chose between anything, you just have to know that you can't drive backwards. Comparing the risk of parking a car backward into a parking spot and backing a large truck with no rear windows is apples to oranges. But if we must compare, the risk of damage is much higher with a truck that can back over a small car with little effort, when you are in the middle of a field you don't expect anyone to be there, like in a parking lot. But people do drive out into the middle of a field in a little pickup to deliver that case of oil or a sandwich or fuel up your truck or combine. (Sidebar, it's not uncommon to bring a fuel truck along side another truck or machinery and fuel it in motion). During harvest, the work day is usually 16+ hours which doesn't include breakfast or dinner and from the start of harvest to the end there are no days off unless it's raining. Add to that that driving in circles for 16 hours a day is a very boring job. Also note that many old grain trucks have poor breaks or breaks that are overloaded when filled. Needing to drive backwards implies that you've pulled the nose of the truck into something of value then used your breaks to stop before you hit it. Given all that and the space that you find around most farms, why would you risk driving backwards?
kabouseng 12y ago
This was a fun read and I can relate, I own a Toyota with over 300k km's on the clock. At 160k the timing belt snapped and bent the valves. Luckily I could afford to take a week off, buy a second hand imported enjin, have a dad who is a mechanical engineer, and learn swap the enjin myself. Then take a second week off work because the new enjin had timing issues which I finally pinpointed to a pirated camshaft pulley where the outer ring of the part would slip. Long story short, my car, even with all the troubles is by far cheaper than any other option, but just like the article states, you have to have certain "privileges" to make it work.
- zo1 12y ago
  Could the timing belt issue have been avoided if it was replaced? Or would you say it was something else that caused it to break, and would have happened regardless?
  - eosrei 12y ago
    Timing belts are 100-120k mile maintenance parts depending on the vehicle. Expect bent valves if you don't replace them at the recommended interval. My car is on it's third.
    - zo1 12y ago
      So if you were to replace them at the 80% mark of those miles... Then you should be very unlikely to have them snap on you unexpectedly?
      - kabouseng 12y ago
        No it doesn't work like that, statistics etc. As with any fixed interval maintenance part there is some chance that the part can fail before being serviced. As per my example, the timing belt was replaced at 100k, so the new belt failed at 60k, just bad luck. Fixed interval maintenance is used for parts with a tight normal distribution when failure occurs and where you can't predict the failure before hand, or it is difficult to measure / predict. Timing belts fits this use case.
te_platt 12y ago
This is a great resource for when your teenager comes to you with terrible eagerness - "Hey Dad, I found a truck online and it's only $1000. Will you come look at it with me?".
peterwwillis 12y ago
There is only one way buying a used car ever makes sense. If you have zero credit, no-one to co-sign with you, thousands of dollars in spending cash, find a perfectly maintained not-damaged low-mileage reliable formerly popular car for 1/10th its original value, and do not depend on getting places in a timely fashion. I have owned about 7 used cars, so I consider myself an authority on bad decisions when it comes to cars. There is no way to cheat the gods of autos. If you want a luxury car, you will forever pay luxury prices. If you want a fast car, it will break quickly. If you want an inexpensive car, the only one worth buying will be the one you want the least. Cheap, reliable, sexy: pick two. Any used car you buy for $1,000 after tax tags & title, and it has no problems, is a good purchase. But don't ever repair it. Use duct tape and WD-40 and change the brakes, but never fix anything on it. When it finally stops running [which will be in 6-12 months] go buy another car. You're still paying less than for a new car. Here are two fun stories. One about a modified sports car, and another about a used luxury car. --- The 1993 Toyota MR2's chameleon paint job gleamed purple-blue-red-orange as I walked around it to the underside of the engine, next to the trunk. The mechanic showed me where the turbo needed to be mounted up, the oil ring seal that had failed (causing turbo overheat and almost explosion) and the OEM replacement they'd tried to order. Only this turbo (and maybe engine?) wasn't OEM - not for America anyway. Apparently the old part had come from some mystery shipment in Japan and installed by a mystery tuning shop in North Carolina, and the mechanic had no idea what kind of oil seal to replace it with. Of course, I had another car to drive, because i'm a privileged 20-year-old IT worker with cash to throw away on a ridiculous used purple sports car. So I continued on to work with my other car(s) while I researched where to find a replacement part. Finally I found it - thanks to a very helpful Toyota dealer in Australia - and had it shipped over for a small fortune. About a month after the initial failure and my little baby was purring like a kitten once more. --- The 2004 Lexus IS300 had what you would call a "colorful history" of parts failures. Long ago the driver side speakers had stopped working and half the speedometer lights had gone out. It had experienced no less than four water-pump-induced radiator meltdowns, with miraculously no warping of the engine. The left rear speed sensor had been replaced after the shreds of cheap drifting tires wrapped itself around the rear axle and tore the wire away. The entire front left suspension i'd replaced over the course of two weeks (at that time I lived 30 minutes walking from my job, so no biggie) after bumping into a curb. After the bumper cover was stolen in Baltimore I collected approximately half it's value from insurance and never replaced it. After another curb-bump (due to ice) and parts replaced by a shady mechanic, the left front speed sensor suddenly stopped working, leaving the traction control disabled. The O2 sensors had long since thrown codes requiring their replacement, or possible investigation of the catalytic converter [of which a replacement is $1,000, one forked proprietary chain of three catalytic converts]. But the most pressing problem was more obvious. The left front headlight had intermittently stopped working some years before in the coldest periods of "Florida winter". It would eventually start working again, so it was ignored until it finally stopped coming on at all; then the headlight that was out would switch places, finally going back to the first. Tried the usual fixes; replace the bulb, nothing. Get a new HID projector (because luxury cars don't come with "stupid old bulbs"; that wouldn't be luxurious), but still nothing. Fuses are all good. Final thought? Electrical problem. No big deal, right? Could be a mystery wiring problem. New wiring harness cost? $1,000. Well screw going OEM, let's go to a junk yard. Oh... IS300s never come into junk yards, do they? Ah huh... seems the parts are so expensive and rare, people get paid to strip the parts and sell 'em on ebay for near-OEM prices, without a guarantee. So here I am, finally paid the used car off after 7 years, in quite a state of disrepair, with a value that is thousands of dollars less than the cost of total repair of all the broken bits. All the rest of the problems can be ignored, but the police stop you for a bad headlight. And then there's the safety inspection. I could have just bought a new car and had half this stuff warrantied, would have been paid off sooner at lower interest rate, and would have been much cheaper to replace had the badge been a large encircled "T" instead of a large encircled "L". Because the same car sold in Japan by Toyota costs thousands less.
sliverstorm 12y ago
Last but not least, I had the ability to just let the car sit. I didn’t need it for anything. It wasn’t the way I was going to make my rent money that month, it wasn’t the way I was going to get my child to the hospital. It was just a car that I was driving for fun. And that’s the biggest kind of Privilege! I can imagine. Wherein we arrive at a key point of strategy in cheap vehicles. Have two. I spent half of college riding a pair of $500 motorcycles. On any given day there was a good chance one was broken with the engine sitting on my driveway- but I never once missed a day of class, thanks to redundancy. Of course that did mean I had to invest $1,000 into vehicles instead of $500. Privilege!, I suppose, but a smaller one. Bonus: the second vehicle takes you to Autozone when you are halfway through a rebuild on the first and discover you are missing your 12mm socket and six bolts
- sejje 12y ago
  Many parts stores deliver, fwiw. I got a part in 20 minutes this past weekend for no upcharge, delivered to my house. And I didn't need it--my car was operable. Just a heater control valve.
- driverdan 12y ago
  Same here. I owned two cars for a while with the same philosophy. Insurance was actually cheaper with two cars instead of one so it saved me money.
geebee 12y ago
I'm twice bitten, once shy on used cars. I know plenty of people who are reasonably frugal who still go for the new car, though I think they view it as more of a slightly risk-averse heuristic than an optimal decision. I think most of them recognize that with planning, effort, and a bit (but not a ton) of luck, they probably would do better used. The risk averse heuristic goes like this: identify a car with a reputation for value, purchase under a buyer's plan, take very good care of itfor the useful life of the car. These aren't the people who show up in a shiny new car every few years - they often keep the car for 15 years or more. Like I said, it's a bit risk and effort averse, since with a lot of research, careful evaluation (including a mechanic inspection), and a bit of luck (more the absence of bad luck), you can definitely beat the above strategy by going used. It's a lot of effort, though. Personally, I did all the things you're supposed to do, and still ended up with lots of $$ repair bills, so I'm no longer interested in used cars. I understand that I got unlucky, but I'm just done. I suppose I'm also particularly convinced by the argument that people generally don't sell good used cars, since I'm one of those people who hangs onto a car until it costs me more to own it than replace it.
- mankyd 12y ago
  > It's a lot of effort, though. This x100. My wife and I recently bought a new car. We went into the process assuming that we'd buy a car that was a couple of years old. After 3 months of casual browsing and research, we bought a new car with a few modest upgrades. We even live in a place with plentiful public transit. We've only put 4000 miles on our 10 month old car - and that's _a lot_ of driving for us. The reason being is that we recently had our first child. We have to get him to daycare somehow before we can go to work. Any time our car is in for repairs, one of us simply stays home with him, as relying on the bus schedule to get us to an from the daycare reliably is a pain. Moreover, we're lucky we can do that on a moments notice. If we worked in jobs where we couldn't work from home, we'd be even more incentivized to buy something reliable. We had an 14 year old car before. We got a new car specifically to avoid having to think about it. As long as we find time for a regular oil change, everything keeps running smoothly.
- dankoss 12y ago
  This was me a few years ago. While I could have bought used, the premium for a known history of the car was worth it since I knew I would keep it for 10+ years. You pay more to reduce some risk over the lifetime of the car.
cheriot 12y ago
So the problem with cheap cars is risk. Are there companies selling after market warranties for these things? I'd be curious to compare a cheap car + triple A + some form of insurance to a recently new car still under warranty.
- SixSigma 12y ago
  We have them in the UK http://www.moneysupermarket.com/car-insurance/car-warranty/ http://www.moneysupermarket.com/car-insurance/car-warranty/ It is also $50 per year for vehicle rescue - they take you to a repair centre of some sort. For $100 per year they will take you to your UK destination. http://www.greenflag.com/ http://www.greenflag.com/
  - aembleton 12y ago
    More like £18.90 ($30) with https://breakdown.rescuemycar.com/ https://breakdown.rescuemycar.com/ I've used them and never had a problem. Things might be a bit different in the UK because the annual MOT gives a good indication that these schemes are going to be dealing with cars that have been mechanically checked. For example my previous car (Renault Clio) failed a couple of times due to the CV boot being torn. CV boot was mentioned in an earlier thread. More on the MOT: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MOT_test http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MOT_test
- balabaster 12y ago
  The recently new car still under warranty still requires insurance... car payment + insurance + gas can still quickly add up. Over the years I've had a used car, a number of leased cars and a financed new car which I will finish paying off in 2 months. I can tell you that during their lifetimes, the used car cost me by far the least (so far). It cost me a a single repair - bodywork for a minor accident and basic maintenance (oil changes etc). The insurance - even fully comprehensive was much less than my other vehicles. Which costs me a small fortune every month (even though I'm almost 40, have never had an accident and only a couple of minor speeding infractions - both less than 15 km/h over the posted limit - both more than 3 years ago.) The leased vehicles cost me the most (comparatively) for their very short lifetimes, but gave me the greatest peace of mind as they were fully warrantied for the life of the lease. At the end of the lease I had a number of options: I can lease another vehicle, rolling what equity I have gained (if there is anything, which dealerships are notorious about making sure there is little or none); I can prepare ahead and put money aside every month for the inevitable balloon payment that comes at the end when you want to buy the lease out, or the headache of trying to refinance this payment; or I can give the vehicle back and basically lose everything I've paid into it during the lifetime of the vehicle. None of these options are great. You're basically renting a car. The warranty on my financed vehicle ran out a full 12 months before my finance and 12,000 km short of my mileage. This had the highest monthly outgoings, I lost (a lot of) money on depreciation. But having had it from new was good for peace of mind and I had constant set payments to the end of the finance period - so none of the headaches you have to deal with when you have a lease, plus at the end of the finance, the car is all yours, to do with as you please. Ongoing maintenance was in a similar ballpark for each vehicle so there were no real savings to compare between any of the vehicles. Gas has largely been the same, I do the same mileage regardless of the vehicle - and the gas mileage has been similar in all vehicles. The biggest saving grace for my financed vehicle is that (I'm hoping) its cost over time (vs. cost of repairs) will gradually decrease to a point that its ongoing costs can be considered negligible... until like everything else, eventually it'll need a repair that is too costly to justify and I'll look for my next purchase, which may well be a used vehicle of the same year/make/model. This way I can rip spare parts off my old one as needed. I can't speak for triple A costs as I haven't needed to pay for triple A since I had a used car as both the leases and the financed vehicle have had triple A for the duration of the finance, however, I've only needed to call it once in all that time because the dealership forgot to include a jack with one vehicle and would you credit it, it was that vehicle I had a blowout and had to change the tire, on the side of a dark, wet, snowy highway at 5am. If there had been a jack, I wouldn't have needed triple A at all. So having been through the cycle with every means of purchasing a vehicle and seeing the financial implications first hand, I think I'm most likely to go back to buying used next time I need another vehicle. My biggest reasons for going that route are: I lose nothing on depreciation; the monthly payments will be negligible, if anything; If I play my cards right, the cost of repairs should be far less than the monthly payments on something new; routine maintenance should keep surprises to a minimum. That's just my $0.02, YMMV
vitd 12y ago
I'm reminded of the song "$1000 Car" by the Bottlerockets. Here's a video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GsbJA9RM4Cc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GsbJA9RM4Cc "Now you're the owner of a $2000 $1000 car"
- mzs 12y ago
  Nice tune, thanks. I like to say, you can afford a $500-2K car if you can afford another $500-2K car today. A buddy replied yesterday that then you have two non-op cars ;) I agree with what the article and one comment says about time and privilege, I'm lucky to have the other circumstances align so as to be able to afford these cheap cars.
protomyth 12y ago
First, if you have no mechanical inclination and don't have mechanical friends, then used cars are problematic. Although you probably be in worse shape buying a new car also. The second problem now is an awfully lot of used cars and used car parts got trashed by the "cash for clunkers" program. I can think of few worse government programs to put the boot to working folks then that program. Its all risk management. Not much different from the buy vs build in computing. Sadly, mechanical training is a dying skill and the risk is much higher. My co-worker just bought a used Subaru for $1,000 and other than needing a belt replacement ($60 and about a hour of time), it was in really good shape. He knows how to look at a car, so all good. Always, always, check the timing belt (or chain) and oil pump on old vehicles. That repair will kill you.
- gknoy 12y ago
  > Always, always, check the timing belt (or chain) and oil pump on old vehicles. How? I'm assuming you mean when evaluating a used car to buy. Do I say "I need to have my mechanic check this...", or is there some kind of car-health certification I should be lookinf for? I wouldn't even know what to look for if checking under the hood myself.
  - protomyth 12y ago
    That's were the mechanic friend comes in :) They should have some sort of maintenance log or shouldn't be offended if you want a mechanic to check it before you buy. If it has over 60,000 miles it better have been inspected and at about 90,000 miles it should have been replaced. This varies by car. A car with an Interference engine will blow up if that belt breaks. Engine replacements are not cheap. A good hint on how things are, open hood, look at belt (this is not the timing belt). Does it have pits? Does it look really worn? If it is, I would make a bet that proper maintenance isn't being done. It is slightly harder than basic fluid maintenance. If you're uncomfortable with all of that, then buy a certified pre-owned from a decent dealer.
    - lafar6502 12y ago
      Or just pay your mechanic to change that freaking belt so you don't have to guess if it's worn out or not.
pwthornton 12y ago
The only person I know who has been able to own and enjoy cheap cars is my friend who sells and fixes up cars. It's not just knowing how to fix up a car that's important, it's also knowing what to look for when buying a used car.
grecy 12y ago
Give me a break. I've never bought a new car in my life and never intend to. My current daily is a 1992 Subaru Loyale that I bought for $450. It has selectable 4x4, gets amazing mileage on the highway (>35mpg) and has lived through many Yukon winters. It starts nicely even below -40C/F. Being a wagon it's an awesome road-trip car and the roof racks often have something on them. It has a few clunks and rattles, and when something major dies I'll ditch it, but at this point I've driven it over 50,000 kms so it owes me nothing. Also in 2007 I bought a 7 year old Jeep Wrangler for $6,250. I then drove it 65,000kms (40k miles) from Alaska to Argentina and never had a single mechanical problem. I sold it after the drive for $5k, so it only "cost" me $1,250.
- O____________O 12y ago
  I then drove it 65,000kms (40k miles) from Alaska to Argentina That sounds interesting. Have you written about it anywhere?
  - grecy 12y ago
    http://theroadchoseme.com http://theroadchoseme.com If you're interested in traveling like that, checkout http://wikioverland.org http://wikioverland.org
- maximuscoolimus 12y ago
  I can guarantee that your Loyale is not comparable to the safety ratings of any new cars. That's a HUGE deciding factor in the used vs new car debate. I'd wager you didn't factor that into your purchasing decision. People with families have passengers' safety to think about when buying a car. Aside from that, while you seem apathetic about the social value surrounding your car - others see the status of a new car as well worth the premium. For those people it can be a hobby or a source of major self-validation and pride.
- drewrv 12y ago
  Did you even read the article? Sounds like you accept the fact that the Subaru can die at any time. The article specifically talks about how that's a privilege that many people don't have. If someone is living paycheck to paycheck, and could get fired from their mcjob for being late, then having a car die could literally lead to homelessness.
diydsp 12y ago
> Tavarish and his friend are both skilled mechanics. [ ... ] Privilege! Skill is not privilege. Skill is acquired through sweat, not conferred. Of two unequally privileged people, one may attend mechanic school, but only the ones who sweat will attain skill.
- ccernaf 12y ago
  You're ignoring the systematic factors that lead to one person being able to attain car-repairing skills over the other. "Al, in fact, was a former Lamborghini tech. What’s that training worth? Do most poor people have it?" No one is denying that Al probably put in a lot of hard work, but that he was able to get to that point is a part of privilege too.
  - diydsp 12y ago
    You seem to claim that privilege will give you skill. It will not. You need sweat to gain skill. Here is a quote from someone who actually became a Lamborghini tech[1]. It supports my statement that sweat is more important than privilege in acquiring skill, emphasis mine: "i did need not go to any toher after school like audi etc. i got perfect attendence and didnt have a grade under 94. i always went to another school at night during my course in high performance engine building. just work hard and when you go to school work hard. more than half the kids sat thier all day talking about cars and didnt care about there grades. and the most important thing you need luck. haha to be honest. i am a technician here on the service side. you never know unless you try. every body told me i was nuts cause i sent about 60 resumes to every top dealer and performance shop that had something to do with lambo and ferrari and all these great companys, and i got it. just work hard and dont give up. my first day at work i got to work on and drive the veyron. it was insane " [1] http://www.lamborghini-talk.com/vbforum/f4/how-become-lamborghini-technician-5790/ http://www.lamborghini-talk.com/vbforum/f4/how-become-lambor...
    - ccernaf 12y ago
      I never claimed that you needed only privilege to gain skill, or that you didn't need sweat to gain skill. What I said was that even those who work hard were able to do so (able to work hard) because of some privilege that they had.
O____________O 12y ago
This is a bit too black and white. The numerous Spanish-speaking men I saw at Autozone at around 10pm on Arizona (the only place I've lived where parts stores were open until 11pm) were good counterpoints[1]. The reality is that it comes down to some combination of know-how, discipline (nobody wants to change an alternator at midnight), resourcefulness, and innumerable other factors. The example in the article -- a failing radiator -- has workarounds that would allow someone to nurse it to and from work. An overworked, single mother of three is pretty unlikely to know the workaround. That said, by all means, buy the newest car you can afford, unless you're specifically seeking a challenge. [1] I noticed that, somewhat ironically, the people in the poorer neighborhoods around Phoenix had the 'privilege' of more parts stores open later.
- jethro_tell 12y ago
  You also have to amortize tools over multiple cars.
bb0wn 12y ago
Just bought my first new car in November. I tried really hard to get a used car, but honestly, it just didn't make any sense -- the cost of financing was much higher, and the cost of the vehicle itself was nearly as much as a brand new model year (this was the case for both the '15 Toyota Corolla and '15 Honda Civic, and their '11 to '13 model year used counterparts.) This doesn't even touch on how difficult it was to find a decent used car in the first place. I guess if you're comfortable with dropping $10k in cash for a decent used car, then you'd save money, but when/if you can finance a new car for very low interest rates, why tie up your liquid cash like that? > For those families, a new-car payment is a burden — but it’s one they can predict and live with. It sucks to “throw away” $300 or $400 every month, but it’s never a surprise and in exchange they have freedom from surprises. How exactly is paying $300-$400 monthly for a new car "throw away" money? It's going towards the ownership of a useful piece of property. Maybe the author is talking about leasing? I don't know.
- phkahler 12y ago
  >> How exactly is paying $300-$400 monthly for a new car "throw away" money? It's going towards the ownership of a useful piece of property. Maybe the author is talking about leasing? I don't know. He's talking about the difference between that monthly payment and paying cash for cheap used car and not having the payment. If you spend $2000 on a crappy car that you maintain yourself, that monthly payment seems like throwing money away. The whole point of the piece is that's not even close to the whole story.
- edvinbesic 12y ago
  Because for some families those $3-400 could be better spent elsewhere so putting it towards a nice new car might seem like a waste, hence the air quotes.
- ssharp 12y ago
  Low interest rates on new cars are a smoke and mirrors game. If you weren't getting low interest rates, you'd be getting a better cash price. I bought a used car earlier this year and financed it at 3%. I'll pay around $1500 in interest. I save several times that in depreciation, and even new with 0% interest, the price still would have been close to that $1500 more. Also, the decision isn't necessarily between brand new car and a 10k used car. If you're buying a two or three year-old car, it's probably over 10k.
lafar6502 12y ago
Yep, a nice example for comparison. How many of you would buy an used car with a million miles on the clock? Weren't anything with less miles available? Consider the value depreciation of a new car, this will usually be several hundred per month, add more insurance costs, costly servicing (because you can't service it anywhere you want), add financing costs (loan or leasing) and you'll see why everybody wants you to buy a new car. Ten year old car is not really that old, come on, and most of the parts/systems are probably perfectly allright.
anythingian 12y ago
Spending $300 - $400 dollars a month with the idea that you wont have surprises in terms of your 'brand new' transportation is a fallacy. I've seen new cars back in the dealership often times more frequently than used cars with 100k on the clock. Although you may not have to 'pay' for the repairs it is still the inconvenience that you'll have associated with a rental car and the time lost. As another commenter pointed out, these guys posses a skill, it's not just about free time. And the skill can be acquired or bought just like most other skills. Some basic education on how to buy a used car and what to look for can save you big $$$, I wrote about how I pick up sub $5000 cars and why financially it almost never makes sense to buy a new car here: http://www.tropicalmba.com/entrepreneurmobile/ http://www.tropicalmba.com/entrepreneurmobile/ Most cars have a sweet spot in terms of maintenance cost and depreciation. You don't have to go down to the $5000 if you aren't comfortable there. Problem is however that comfort for most uneducated used car buyers is relative and mostly not related to the actual condition of the vehicle. Most people think newer is more reliable. While in many instances that can be the case, IMO it certainly doesn't justify the price that comes with it. For many buyers a good window to consider is 2-6 years old. The vehicle will still be going through it's depreciation cycle (so you will be paying for that) but will generally have somewhere between 20-100k miles on it. In most modern vehicles you probably won't have to repair anything major during a 2-4 year ownership period depending on where your car is in the cycle. It's a good idea to have an ownership timeline for your purchase. I personally like to drive something different every year or two. I know most people like to set it and forget it. Either way, having a plan for ownership length is an important part of the equation and can help you to factor depreciation and mitigating risk. Finally. The Japanese and Germans still build the best vehicles unless you want a truck. It's very unpatriotic but save yourself the headache and don't buy an american car. It's really easy to try and argue this one until you try and remember the last time you saw a mid- nineties Ford Taurus on the road. Same can't be said for a Civic.. The resale prices will corroborate here as well, you may be tempted to jump into a $6000 2008 Chevy Malibu... it's a trap! Poor build quality and low resale potential make these very bad choices.
mncolinlee 12y ago
I know a number of friends who hear the sticker price and think my decision to acquire a Nissan LEAF electric car is an expensive and ridiculous luxury. They're both wrong and right for the same reasons the OP's friend is wrong and right. At the time I bought my car, one study had shown the LEAF as the second cheapest total cost of ownership of all US-sold automobiles after the Toyota Yaris. My own research showed their electric cost assumptions didn't factor in off-peak rates at one-third of normal costs. Even with today's low gas prices, some new electric cars' TCOs can compare favorably against their gas competitors. On the other hand, privilege has to factor in. Range anxiety doesn't matter if you have money. I've never run out of electricity and I can afford to be late to appointments if needed. I can afford the uncertainty of being an early adopter in a cold weather state with fewer chargers because I have alternatives available if needed. Electric cars will become a no-brainer for cost sensitive people in future as ranges increase and used ones become more available. However, my decision only makes sense with some level of privilege.

149 points by passive 12y ago

I found this piece to be pretty much garbage. OMG only rich people can get a ride from their wife!!!! The article should have been: You gotta be a mechanic to own a cheap luxury/sports car.

freehunter 12y ago
You have to be good at repairing cars, but probably not an actual mechanic. An actual mechanic may not make enough to afford the parts. I had a truck that was less than reliable in the past. I had all the know-how and tools to fix everything myself, and even had the money to buy the parts. But I shed a single tear and then traded it in for a newer, more reliable car because, while I was making good money, I had been sitting in my driveway at 8:05am still trying to crank the engine over a few times too many. My boss wanted me there at 8, not 9:15 when I was able to get a ride from someone else. And that's half the point of the article. If your job demands you be there on time, you can't own a clunker even if you can afford to fix it and know how to fix it.
- steverb 12y ago
  My personal solution has been to own two clunkers, but my wife says it's a personal sickness on my part (I like clunkers). I blame the fact that while I am not personally a redneck, I am descended from a very long line of rednecks and can't remember a time when we didn't own at least one car that didn't run. And that's not even counting the beloved "donor" cars. :-)
  - wernercd 12y ago
    As long as one (or more) of those clunkers isn't hiding under un-mowed grass and surrounded by broken garden gnomes :)
  - KingMob 12y ago
    Just think of it as "cloud transporting". One automobile instance goes down, fail back to another. You could start a new business like... maybe EngineYard? :)
    - jethro_tell 12y ago
      Ha, for a Minute I forgot that I was on HN.
    - lafar6502 12y ago
      You not only have HA cluster, you can also do some load-balancing - this way you have two cars with 30k miles on each instead of just one car with 60k :) Just basic math - which one setup will depreciate faster?
    - steverb 12y ago
      That is almost exactly how I view it. I can buy two super cheap cars for less than one very reliable one, and when it's something that I can't fix cheaply or quickly enough I sell off the car and go buy another. I also stick to the one pay check rule for cars, in that no car I buy should cost more than one paycheck, although I did make an exception for the van we use to haul the younguns around in.
  - freehunter 12y ago
    My solution was to buy another clunker when I was in the financial position to be able to afford having two cars. It hasn't stopped running yet, the real challenge will be convincing the wife to let me keep it after it does stop running. There's something relaxing about spending a weekend under a truck, putting it all back together, and driving it around knowing it's only alive because you saved it.
- driverdan 12y ago
  > An actual mechanic may not make enough to afford the parts. What? You realize mechanics can make good money right? Most shops charge $100+/h.
  - freehunter 12y ago
    What shops charge and what mechanics get is two different things. My company charges $100+/h for my time, but I make far less than that. Two friends who work as mechanics make $20/hr (senior-level) and $8/hr (junior level). Mechanics can make good money, just like programmers can make good money. But there are an awful lot of programmers out there making comparatively nothing.
steverb 12y ago
I did not get that from the article at all. Just that there are certain costs to owning a used car that you don't usually incur when owning a new one. I thought the author was acknowledging that he was better equipped to deal with those costs than someone else might be in a different life situation. And for those other people, it might actually make more sense for them to own a newer car even if it might appear at first blush that they were being less responsible with their money than we might think they should be. In other words, there's no such thing as a free lunch.
- mikeash 12y ago
  The article needs a new title. "You gotta be rich to own a car with almost a million miles on it" would be much better. Of course, this is a pretty obvious thing to say, so it probably wouldn't get as many clicks. But at least it would be honest. It makes no sense to talk about costs of "owning a used car." The costs involved in owning a two-year-old midrange Toyota with 20,000 miles on it are completely different from the costs involved in owning an ancient luxury car that's driven the equivalent of to the Moon and back twice. Buying a Lexus with 900,000 miles on it is so unusual that there's no way to generalize the story beyond it.
  - sejje 12y ago
    I'm not sure what it read when you wrote this comment, but it currently reads "to own a cheap car." Used is implied, certainly, but I don't think "barely used" is part of it. Basically, a two-year-old Toyota with 20k miles doesn't qualify.
    - mikeash 12y ago
      Which "it"? The comment I'm replying to says, "Just that there are certain costs to owning a used car that you don't usually incur when owning a new one." In any case, there's a wide universe of cheap cars (and what exactly is the threshold for "cheap" anyway?) just as there is a wide universe of used cars.
- maxlybbert 12y ago
wernercd 12y ago
It was more than just "being a mechanic". It's * being a mechanic (so you don't have to pay $500 for a $200 job). * having a job with flexible hours (This happens on the way to McJob and your late? McBye Bye.) * having someone else dependable with a flexible job (Friday night and everyone know you know is working at McJobs?) * having someone to take care of your kids so the kid is at home/daycare/babysitters and not freezing in your car * having spare money so the choice isn't food vs radiator * being able to easily adjust to different circumstances. Not everyone can lose a car and adjust with minimal effort. car breaks down and you expect McJob holder to be able to afford another car? thousand(s) for fix? downpayment on a replacment in short order? All of this revolves around the fact that he's in a good place, and able to count his blessings. If all you got out of this is "you gotta be a mechanic" then you need to re-read it.
- jerf 12y ago
  “The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money. "Take boots, for example. He earned thirty-eight dollars a month plus allowances. A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about ten dollars. Those were the kind of boots Vimes always bought, and wore until the soles were so thin that he could tell where he was in Ankh-Morpork on a foggy night by the feel of the cobbles. "But the thing was that good boots lasted for years and years. A man who could afford fifty dollars had a pair of boots that'd still be keeping his feet dry in ten years' time, while the poor man who could only afford cheap boots would have spent a hundred dollars on boots in the same time and would still have wet feet. "This was the Captain Samuel Vimes 'Boots' theory of socioeconomic unfairness.” - Terry Pratchett, Men At Arms: The Play http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/72745-the-reason-that-the-rich-were-so-rich-vimes-reasoned http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/72745-the-reason-that-the-ri...
  - nowarninglabel 12y ago
    This is a good point, and why it usually be framed in a different way, that some people get rich by being very value-oriented. It's about getting the best bang for the buck.
tdicola 12y ago
Not to mention there's a huge difference between a used car with 890k! miles vs. a used car with closer to 70-100k miles. Sure that Lexus is a well built Toyota with good reliability, but at that mileage you're going to be expecting things to break. On the other hand if you get a less than 10 year old car with under 100k miles, unless it's known to have major issues, you shouldn't have nearly the amount of problems.

normloman 12y ago

I come from a poor family, and I'm no rich guy now. My family has always owned used cars. My current used car has saved me a ton of money, and as long as I maintain it, it will last a very long time. And by no means am I some great mechanic. I know how to change the filters, I get jiffy lube to change my oil, and thats it. So buying a used car can make a lot of sense. Of course, I'm not buying a used Maserati. That's just stupid.

freehunter 12y ago
He didn't write about buying used card. In fact, he even made a point about buying not-that-old Civics, because there is no risk to owning a used Civic. But changing your oil and filters won't help you when the CV joint snaps going down the road (and it's going to happen someday), or when the alternator seizes up, or when the starter won't turn over, or when the timing belt snaps without warning. All of those things can happen on an older vehicle without a moment's notice, and besides the timing belt, none of them are commonly found on a scheduled maintenance calendar. Changing your oil only helps until that odometer rolls over 250k (for a reliable car) or even 90k (for a cheap econobox). The point isn't "don't buy a used car", it's "don't listen to articles saying you should buy a car with a million miles for $1000".
- normloman 12y ago
  I read the article. He mentioned the civic thing once, and didn't explicitly recommend buying used civics. It wasn't mentioned in the title either. So I wanted to comment here, just in case anyone got the wrong idea that used cars are expensive.
- jacquesm 12y ago
  CV joints 'snap' when they have been left without lube or have been driven way past their lifespan (normally the life of the vehicle but for smaller cars they are fragile enough that it is not rare to see them go). One major reason for CV joint problems is the CV joint boot tearing allowing road grime in and grease out of the joint (they warm up enough that the lube becomes fluid and of course there is all the swirling which will happily empty a fully greased up CV joint in a few hundred kilometers). So you inspect those periodically and replace them when they have a large enough number of miles on them. Maintenance is everything with things that you use every day and that you depend on. It's like technical debt in software: you can ignore it for a bit but then you end up paying double or worse. A CV joint is a wear part itself too, so if it has done its duty you replace it. (Not all that hard, but definitely not 'can barely replace a tire' territory.)

jkot 12y ago

That is how you make money on internet. Car broke down? Dress it up and write an article. In next level write about someone sooo rich, he does not even own the car.

m52go 12y ago
What are you referring to? Tavarish's blog is gold. Baruth's post is thoughtful commentary and reflection. None of it is click-bait.
- jkot 12y ago
  I just don't get this guy. He is trying to thoughtfully mock some reflection, but it just show him as an alien from different planet. Yes, there are people who have to rely on $500 cars. Yes, cars sometimes broke down, people have to walk, freeze whatever. And yes, you should do maintenance even on cheap used cars. And yes, if you buy junk you should probably change some critical parts. And no, it is not a privilege to own this sort of car.
spacecadet 12y ago
Actually yes. During college;a friend of mine and I would purchase broken-used-sports-cars on craigslist, repair them in a garage we rented and resell them. I owned some sweet cars for as little as weeks at a time, made some loot(a little) and I learned a shit ton about fixing cars.

Zigurd 12y ago

Meh. Older luxury cars can be great cheap cars for the kids, as long as you avoid extreme high mileage, known expensive parts issues, and dubious service records. CARFAX is useful: You get to see service records. I would pick a 10-15 year old Benz with 100k miles (where the prices come down quickly) that's been dealer-serviced, over a Subaru or Volvo. Any decent car should go 200k miles before it becomes a money sink, and Lexus, BMW, and Benz engines should run to 300k miles before anything expensive wears out. Automatic transmissions and rev-limiters make it hard to destroy an engine through abuse. Non-turbo 6 and 8 cylinder luxury car engines have led an easy life. The cars they are talking about are either semi-exotic high performance models that probably have been whipped, or super-high-mileage. That's called having a hobby.

AmVess 12y ago
Used German cars are among the biggest money sinks on the planet aside from unaffordable exotics. Out of dozens of friends and dozens and dozens of Euro cars, not a single person has had an inexpensive to repair or own BMW/Mercedes/Audi/SAAB...new or used. And these are cared for vehicles, not rolling wrecks or the result of careless owners. My 95k Ford had 1 repair in the years that I owned it (a rarity for Ford)...a thermostat. My 70k miles Honda has had $0 in repairs since 2006. German luxury cars only make sense if leased from new (which 70% of them are). Used? Run far away, and run fast.
- sejje 12y ago
  I've owned several fords that all held up well: 1989 Ford Taurus: $450 car, required new battery terminals. Totaled it out fairly quickly--side note: head on collision at approx 45mph with no seat belt, walked away with scratches. Given 3300 by insurance people for the car only. 199X Ford Escort Hatchback: $500 car, zero maintenance over a couple of years. Eventually started stalling in neutral unless you revved it, I sold it to my sister for $200 and bought something else. Vaccuum hose had a hole, $4 fix. 1987 Ford Mustang: $3500 car, required a clutch immediately for $800. Drove for several years with no further mechanical problems (though it did have body issues), sold it for $2250. The decrease in value was almost wholly my own fault in causing & then neglecting the body issues. I had one lemon, but not a Ford. A 199x Pontiac Grand Am. $850 car, immediately needed tires & a water pump (making it a $1200 car). Broke down approximately 15 times for various reasons, mostly small problems or problems I learned to live with. I eventually got a noticed it would be towed if not moved from where I had it parked, and I decided it was prudent to let it be towed. Otherwise: 1996 Nissan Pickup: $3k car in 2009, still own it, has had zero repairs. Several things have failed: A/C, both front blinkers fell out of the truck, someone backed into the front bumper and misaligned the headlights, broken into & stereo & speakers stolen. Engine is otherwise perfect, though. I'm trying to sell it now, as I bought a Jeep Cherokee about a month ago. I would be incredibly surprised if I can't get $1500 for it, but I have someone coming to look this weekend at $2400 asking price. Maybe I've been lucky, but the total amount of repair fees I've paid over all of these, including the lemon, is somewhere around $3k I'd guess, vehicles overall costing me a couple thousand for the last 15 years of vehicles, usually with redundancy by owning 2 at a time. I own a motorcycle now, as well, so I have three levels. I did the easiest repairs myself. If I couldn't learn it in 20 minutes on youtube, I paid someone else.

lumberjack 12y ago

No you don't. New Toyota corolla: $16,000 2005 Toyota corolla: $4,000 I don't think there exists a scenario where you can end up outspending the MSRP if you buy a used previous model. Say for example your absolute lemon has chassis damage and needs to be scrapped (that's the absolute worst scenario). You still have $12,000 with which to buy another used car. Say you spend a whole week working on it to fix something catastrophic. I don't think anything would take that long but anyway. How many people actually make $12,000 in a week? Not many that need to save money on cars.

dangerlibrary 12y ago
It's almost like you didn't read the article to discover that his point was only tangentially related to the headline.
- mahranch 12y ago
  Bingo. It's pretty common for people to comment without reading the link on sites like reddit, but that was never the case here. Until recently, that is. They see the title, then head right to the comment section to give their "superior" opinion.
  - freehunter 12y ago
    When I came in here, there were three top-level comments and all of them were variations on "I drive a late-model used version of a reliable car with relatively low miles and it's never broken down!" I would say more than half of the people commenting here either did not read or did not absorb the message of the article.
  - zo1 12y ago
    I don't see it that way. As long as the posting itself causes discussion to occur, then that's great. If that happens because of the title, rather than the content then so be it. Additionally, I'm mostly participating and reading the comments here because of the general topic of new vs used cars. The content, at least in this case, is irrelevant to me.

andkon 12y ago

There's a reason that I have always loved reading TTAC and will always continue to read it. These guys are thoughtful and interesting to a degree that is only rivalled by how insular and myopic most car people are. They taught teenaged me a lot of lessons about critical thinking by laying it on top of one of my favourite topics - cars. Enough of a love letter - I agree with the point. There's a similar thing that happens with house owners: owning a whole bunch of tools and being able to fix your own stuff is a privilege that middle class people enjoy, but poor people do not. You have to pay for the ability to plan for contingencies, and if you can barely afford to pay for your living expenses, you definitely can't afford to pay for the $50 battery charger, or the $30 socket set, or the time and energy required to learn all this stuff in the first place and put it into action when you need it done.

gaius 12y ago
It's the same with the tastefully minimalist lifestyle - being able to say "I'll just buy (another) one of those if I need it" and throwing something perfectly good out, is a privilege of the rich. It takes money to own very little.
sukilot 12y ago
Many cities have Tool Libraries and Lendof Libraries. They are wonderful.

IshKebab 12y ago

This lead me to: http://www.fancyparking.com/ http://www.fancyparking.com/

freehunter 12y ago
Is it just pictures of people who backed into a parking spot? The gallery requires Flash, so I haven't seen it. There are actually some places around here that have signs explicitly disallowing backing into a parking space for one reason or another. Anyway, I was taught in drivers training (in the US) that if you are able to pull through a parking space so the front of your car is parked towards the road, you should. Not sure how common that message is.
- jethro_tell 12y ago
  I worked on farms as a kid. We expressly didn't allow backing up in farm trucks. To the point where that part of the transmission was removed on most big farm trucks and we were told to park in a way that allowed only going forward. Pretty easy when you spend most of your time parking in giant fields, but even now in my city life I try to avoid the risk of driving backwards.
  - bmelton 12y ago
    I generally prefer to either "pull through" into a spot so that I can "leave forward" or, if the lot is full enough, back into a spot... logic being that I either have to back in to the spot or out of the spot, and backing into the spot is slightly more controlled (given the minimal foot traffic into a spot) compared to the challenge of backing out of a spot into the lanes where people/children/etc are walking. I can't imagine a reason you wouldn't be able to do the same in a farm truck, except for the sometimes when it's towing something. Care to expound?
    - jethro_tell 12y ago
      Sure, in the parking lot, you are choosing between backing in or backing out. I find backing in to be the better option for two reasons. The first being that you can drive by and see who/what is in the spot. Second, like you said, the access to the spot is better controlled. In the farm case, you can always drive forward. It was part of the engineering of the workflow for that operation; for every operation, there is a forward path to completion. You don't have to chose between anything, you just have to know that you can't drive backwards. Comparing the risk of parking a car backward into a parking spot and backing a large truck with no rear windows is apples to oranges. But if we must compare, the risk of damage is much higher with a truck that can back over a small car with little effort, when you are in the middle of a field you don't expect anyone to be there, like in a parking lot. But people do drive out into the middle of a field in a little pickup to deliver that case of oil or a sandwich or fuel up your truck or combine. (Sidebar, it's not uncommon to bring a fuel truck along side another truck or machinery and fuel it in motion). During harvest, the work day is usually 16+ hours which doesn't include breakfast or dinner and from the start of harvest to the end there are no days off unless it's raining. Add to that that driving in circles for 16 hours a day is a very boring job. Also note that many old grain trucks have poor breaks or breaks that are overloaded when filled. Needing to drive backwards implies that you've pulled the nose of the truck into something of value then used your breaks to stop before you hit it. Given all that and the space that you find around most farms, why would you risk driving backwards?

kabouseng 12y ago

This was a fun read and I can relate, I own a Toyota with over 300k km's on the clock. At 160k the timing belt snapped and bent the valves. Luckily I could afford to take a week off, buy a second hand imported enjin, have a dad who is a mechanical engineer, and learn swap the enjin myself. Then take a second week off work because the new enjin had timing issues which I finally pinpointed to a pirated camshaft pulley where the outer ring of the part would slip. Long story short, my car, even with all the troubles is by far cheaper than any other option, but just like the article states, you have to have certain "privileges" to make it work.

zo1 12y ago
Could the timing belt issue have been avoided if it was replaced? Or would you say it was something else that caused it to break, and would have happened regardless?
- eosrei 12y ago
  Timing belts are 100-120k mile maintenance parts depending on the vehicle. Expect bent valves if you don't replace them at the recommended interval. My car is on it's third.
  - zo1 12y ago
    So if you were to replace them at the 80% mark of those miles... Then you should be very unlikely to have them snap on you unexpectedly?
    - kabouseng 12y ago
      No it doesn't work like that, statistics etc. As with any fixed interval maintenance part there is some chance that the part can fail before being serviced. As per my example, the timing belt was replaced at 100k, so the new belt failed at 60k, just bad luck. Fixed interval maintenance is used for parts with a tight normal distribution when failure occurs and where you can't predict the failure before hand, or it is difficult to measure / predict. Timing belts fits this use case.

te_platt 12y ago

This is a great resource for when your teenager comes to you with terrible eagerness - "Hey Dad, I found a truck online and it's only $1000. Will you come look at it with me?".

peterwwillis 12y ago

There is only one way buying a used car ever makes sense. If you have zero credit, no-one to co-sign with you, thousands of dollars in spending cash, find a perfectly maintained not-damaged low-mileage reliable formerly popular car for 1/10th its original value, and do not depend on getting places in a timely fashion. I have owned about 7 used cars, so I consider myself an authority on bad decisions when it comes to cars. There is no way to cheat the gods of autos. If you want a luxury car, you will forever pay luxury prices. If you want a fast car, it will break quickly. If you want an inexpensive car, the only one worth buying will be the one you want the least. Cheap, reliable, sexy: pick two. Any used car you buy for $1,000 after tax tags & title, and it has no problems, is a good purchase. But don't ever repair it. Use duct tape and WD-40 and change the brakes, but never fix anything on it. When it finally stops running [which will be in 6-12 months] go buy another car. You're still paying less than for a new car. Here are two fun stories. One about a modified sports car, and another about a used luxury car. --- The 1993 Toyota MR2's chameleon paint job gleamed purple-blue-red-orange as I walked around it to the underside of the engine, next to the trunk. The mechanic showed me where the turbo needed to be mounted up, the oil ring seal that had failed (causing turbo overheat and almost explosion) and the OEM replacement they'd tried to order. Only this turbo (and maybe engine?) wasn't OEM - not for America anyway. Apparently the old part had come from some mystery shipment in Japan and installed by a mystery tuning shop in North Carolina, and the mechanic had no idea what kind of oil seal to replace it with. Of course, I had another car to drive, because i'm a privileged 20-year-old IT worker with cash to throw away on a ridiculous used purple sports car. So I continued on to work with my other car(s) while I researched where to find a replacement part. Finally I found it - thanks to a very helpful Toyota dealer in Australia - and had it shipped over for a small fortune. About a month after the initial failure and my little baby was purring like a kitten once more. --- The 2004 Lexus IS300 had what you would call a "colorful history" of parts failures. Long ago the driver side speakers had stopped working and half the speedometer lights had gone out. It had experienced no less than four water-pump-induced radiator meltdowns, with miraculously no warping of the engine. The left rear speed sensor had been replaced after the shreds of cheap drifting tires wrapped itself around the rear axle and tore the wire away. The entire front left suspension i'd replaced over the course of two weeks (at that time I lived 30 minutes walking from my job, so no biggie) after bumping into a curb. After the bumper cover was stolen in Baltimore I collected approximately half it's value from insurance and never replaced it. After another curb-bump (due to ice) and parts replaced by a shady mechanic, the left front speed sensor suddenly stopped working, leaving the traction control disabled. The O2 sensors had long since thrown codes requiring their replacement, or possible investigation of the catalytic converter [of which a replacement is $1,000, one forked proprietary chain of three catalytic converts]. But the most pressing problem was more obvious. The left front headlight had intermittently stopped working some years before in the coldest periods of "Florida winter". It would eventually start working again, so it was ignored until it finally stopped coming on at all; then the headlight that was out would switch places, finally going back to the first. Tried the usual fixes; replace the bulb, nothing. Get a new HID projector (because luxury cars don't come with "stupid old bulbs"; that wouldn't be luxurious), but still nothing. Fuses are all good. Final thought? Electrical problem. No big deal, right? Could be a mystery wiring problem. New wiring harness cost? $1,000. Well screw going OEM, let's go to a junk yard. Oh... IS300s never come into junk yards, do they? Ah huh... seems the parts are so expensive and rare, people get paid to strip the parts and sell 'em on ebay for near-OEM prices, without a guarantee. So here I am, finally paid the used car off after 7 years, in quite a state of disrepair, with a value that is thousands of dollars less than the cost of total repair of all the broken bits. All the rest of the problems can be ignored, but the police stop you for a bad headlight. And then there's the safety inspection. I could have just bought a new car and had half this stuff warrantied, would have been paid off sooner at lower interest rate, and would have been much cheaper to replace had the badge been a large encircled "T" instead of a large encircled "L". Because the same car sold in Japan by Toyota costs thousands less.

sliverstorm 12y ago

Last but not least, I had the ability to just let the car sit. I didn’t need it for anything. It wasn’t the way I was going to make my rent money that month, it wasn’t the way I was going to get my child to the hospital. It was just a car that I was driving for fun. And that’s the biggest kind of Privilege! I can imagine. Wherein we arrive at a key point of strategy in cheap vehicles. Have two. I spent half of college riding a pair of $500 motorcycles. On any given day there was a good chance one was broken with the engine sitting on my driveway- but I never once missed a day of class, thanks to redundancy. Of course that did mean I had to invest $1,000 into vehicles instead of $500. Privilege!, I suppose, but a smaller one. Bonus: the second vehicle takes you to Autozone when you are halfway through a rebuild on the first and discover you are missing your 12mm socket and six bolts

sejje 12y ago
Many parts stores deliver, fwiw. I got a part in 20 minutes this past weekend for no upcharge, delivered to my house. And I didn't need it--my car was operable. Just a heater control valve.
driverdan 12y ago
Same here. I owned two cars for a while with the same philosophy. Insurance was actually cheaper with two cars instead of one so it saved me money.

geebee 12y ago

I'm twice bitten, once shy on used cars. I know plenty of people who are reasonably frugal who still go for the new car, though I think they view it as more of a slightly risk-averse heuristic than an optimal decision. I think most of them recognize that with planning, effort, and a bit (but not a ton) of luck, they probably would do better used. The risk averse heuristic goes like this: identify a car with a reputation for value, purchase under a buyer's plan, take very good care of itfor the useful life of the car. These aren't the people who show up in a shiny new car every few years - they often keep the car for 15 years or more. Like I said, it's a bit risk and effort averse, since with a lot of research, careful evaluation (including a mechanic inspection), and a bit of luck (more the absence of bad luck), you can definitely beat the above strategy by going used. It's a lot of effort, though. Personally, I did all the things you're supposed to do, and still ended up with lots of $$ repair bills, so I'm no longer interested in used cars. I understand that I got unlucky, but I'm just done. I suppose I'm also particularly convinced by the argument that people generally don't sell good used cars, since I'm one of those people who hangs onto a car until it costs me more to own it than replace it.

mankyd 12y ago
> It's a lot of effort, though. This x100. My wife and I recently bought a new car. We went into the process assuming that we'd buy a car that was a couple of years old. After 3 months of casual browsing and research, we bought a new car with a few modest upgrades. We even live in a place with plentiful public transit. We've only put 4000 miles on our 10 month old car - and that's _a lot_ of driving for us. The reason being is that we recently had our first child. We have to get him to daycare somehow before we can go to work. Any time our car is in for repairs, one of us simply stays home with him, as relying on the bus schedule to get us to an from the daycare reliably is a pain. Moreover, we're lucky we can do that on a moments notice. If we worked in jobs where we couldn't work from home, we'd be even more incentivized to buy something reliable. We had an 14 year old car before. We got a new car specifically to avoid having to think about it. As long as we find time for a regular oil change, everything keeps running smoothly.
dankoss 12y ago
This was me a few years ago. While I could have bought used, the premium for a known history of the car was worth it since I knew I would keep it for 10+ years. You pay more to reduce some risk over the lifetime of the car.

cheriot 12y ago

So the problem with cheap cars is risk. Are there companies selling after market warranties for these things? I'd be curious to compare a cheap car + triple A + some form of insurance to a recently new car still under warranty.

SixSigma 12y ago
We have them in the UK http://www.moneysupermarket.com/car-insurance/car-warranty/ http://www.moneysupermarket.com/car-insurance/car-warranty/ It is also $50 per year for vehicle rescue - they take you to a repair centre of some sort. For $100 per year they will take you to your UK destination. http://www.greenflag.com/ http://www.greenflag.com/
- aembleton 12y ago
  More like £18.90 ($30) with https://breakdown.rescuemycar.com/ https://breakdown.rescuemycar.com/ I've used them and never had a problem. Things might be a bit different in the UK because the annual MOT gives a good indication that these schemes are going to be dealing with cars that have been mechanically checked. For example my previous car (Renault Clio) failed a couple of times due to the CV boot being torn. CV boot was mentioned in an earlier thread. More on the MOT: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MOT_test http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MOT_test
balabaster 12y ago
The recently new car still under warranty still requires insurance... car payment + insurance + gas can still quickly add up. Over the years I've had a used car, a number of leased cars and a financed new car which I will finish paying off in 2 months. I can tell you that during their lifetimes, the used car cost me by far the least (so far). It cost me a a single repair - bodywork for a minor accident and basic maintenance (oil changes etc). The insurance - even fully comprehensive was much less than my other vehicles. Which costs me a small fortune every month (even though I'm almost 40, have never had an accident and only a couple of minor speeding infractions - both less than 15 km/h over the posted limit - both more than 3 years ago.) The leased vehicles cost me the most (comparatively) for their very short lifetimes, but gave me the greatest peace of mind as they were fully warrantied for the life of the lease. At the end of the lease I had a number of options: I can lease another vehicle, rolling what equity I have gained (if there is anything, which dealerships are notorious about making sure there is little or none); I can prepare ahead and put money aside every month for the inevitable balloon payment that comes at the end when you want to buy the lease out, or the headache of trying to refinance this payment; or I can give the vehicle back and basically lose everything I've paid into it during the lifetime of the vehicle. None of these options are great. You're basically renting a car. The warranty on my financed vehicle ran out a full 12 months before my finance and 12,000 km short of my mileage. This had the highest monthly outgoings, I lost (a lot of) money on depreciation. But having had it from new was good for peace of mind and I had constant set payments to the end of the finance period - so none of the headaches you have to deal with when you have a lease, plus at the end of the finance, the car is all yours, to do with as you please. Ongoing maintenance was in a similar ballpark for each vehicle so there were no real savings to compare between any of the vehicles. Gas has largely been the same, I do the same mileage regardless of the vehicle - and the gas mileage has been similar in all vehicles. The biggest saving grace for my financed vehicle is that (I'm hoping) its cost over time (vs. cost of repairs) will gradually decrease to a point that its ongoing costs can be considered negligible... until like everything else, eventually it'll need a repair that is too costly to justify and I'll look for my next purchase, which may well be a used vehicle of the same year/make/model. This way I can rip spare parts off my old one as needed. I can't speak for triple A costs as I haven't needed to pay for triple A since I had a used car as both the leases and the financed vehicle have had triple A for the duration of the finance, however, I've only needed to call it once in all that time because the dealership forgot to include a jack with one vehicle and would you credit it, it was that vehicle I had a blowout and had to change the tire, on the side of a dark, wet, snowy highway at 5am. If there had been a jack, I wouldn't have needed triple A at all. So having been through the cycle with every means of purchasing a vehicle and seeing the financial implications first hand, I think I'm most likely to go back to buying used next time I need another vehicle. My biggest reasons for going that route are: I lose nothing on depreciation; the monthly payments will be negligible, if anything; If I play my cards right, the cost of repairs should be far less than the monthly payments on something new; routine maintenance should keep surprises to a minimum. That's just my $0.02, YMMV

vitd 12y ago

I'm reminded of the song "$1000 Car" by the Bottlerockets. Here's a video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GsbJA9RM4Cc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GsbJA9RM4Cc "Now you're the owner of a $2000 $1000 car"

mzs 12y ago
Nice tune, thanks. I like to say, you can afford a $500-2K car if you can afford another $500-2K car today. A buddy replied yesterday that then you have two non-op cars ;) I agree with what the article and one comment says about time and privilege, I'm lucky to have the other circumstances align so as to be able to afford these cheap cars.

protomyth 12y ago

First, if you have no mechanical inclination and don't have mechanical friends, then used cars are problematic. Although you probably be in worse shape buying a new car also. The second problem now is an awfully lot of used cars and used car parts got trashed by the "cash for clunkers" program. I can think of few worse government programs to put the boot to working folks then that program. Its all risk management. Not much different from the buy vs build in computing. Sadly, mechanical training is a dying skill and the risk is much higher. My co-worker just bought a used Subaru for $1,000 and other than needing a belt replacement ($60 and about a hour of time), it was in really good shape. He knows how to look at a car, so all good. Always, always, check the timing belt (or chain) and oil pump on old vehicles. That repair will kill you.

gknoy 12y ago
> Always, always, check the timing belt (or chain) and oil pump on old vehicles. How? I'm assuming you mean when evaluating a used car to buy. Do I say "I need to have my mechanic check this...", or is there some kind of car-health certification I should be lookinf for? I wouldn't even know what to look for if checking under the hood myself.
- protomyth 12y ago
  That's were the mechanic friend comes in :) They should have some sort of maintenance log or shouldn't be offended if you want a mechanic to check it before you buy. If it has over 60,000 miles it better have been inspected and at about 90,000 miles it should have been replaced. This varies by car. A car with an Interference engine will blow up if that belt breaks. Engine replacements are not cheap. A good hint on how things are, open hood, look at belt (this is not the timing belt). Does it have pits? Does it look really worn? If it is, I would make a bet that proper maintenance isn't being done. It is slightly harder than basic fluid maintenance. If you're uncomfortable with all of that, then buy a certified pre-owned from a decent dealer.
  - lafar6502 12y ago
    Or just pay your mechanic to change that freaking belt so you don't have to guess if it's worn out or not.

pwthornton 12y ago

The only person I know who has been able to own and enjoy cheap cars is my friend who sells and fixes up cars. It's not just knowing how to fix up a car that's important, it's also knowing what to look for when buying a used car.

grecy 12y ago

Give me a break. I've never bought a new car in my life and never intend to. My current daily is a 1992 Subaru Loyale that I bought for $450. It has selectable 4x4, gets amazing mileage on the highway (>35mpg) and has lived through many Yukon winters. It starts nicely even below -40C/F. Being a wagon it's an awesome road-trip car and the roof racks often have something on them. It has a few clunks and rattles, and when something major dies I'll ditch it, but at this point I've driven it over 50,000 kms so it owes me nothing. Also in 2007 I bought a 7 year old Jeep Wrangler for $6,250. I then drove it 65,000kms (40k miles) from Alaska to Argentina and never had a single mechanical problem. I sold it after the drive for $5k, so it only "cost" me $1,250.

O____________O 12y ago
I then drove it 65,000kms (40k miles) from Alaska to Argentina That sounds interesting. Have you written about it anywhere?
- grecy 12y ago
  http://theroadchoseme.com http://theroadchoseme.com If you're interested in traveling like that, checkout http://wikioverland.org http://wikioverland.org
maximuscoolimus 12y ago
I can guarantee that your Loyale is not comparable to the safety ratings of any new cars. That's a HUGE deciding factor in the used vs new car debate. I'd wager you didn't factor that into your purchasing decision. People with families have passengers' safety to think about when buying a car. Aside from that, while you seem apathetic about the social value surrounding your car - others see the status of a new car as well worth the premium. For those people it can be a hobby or a source of major self-validation and pride.
drewrv 12y ago
Did you even read the article? Sounds like you accept the fact that the Subaru can die at any time. The article specifically talks about how that's a privilege that many people don't have. If someone is living paycheck to paycheck, and could get fired from their mcjob for being late, then having a car die could literally lead to homelessness.

diydsp 12y ago

> Tavarish and his friend are both skilled mechanics. [ ... ] Privilege! Skill is not privilege. Skill is acquired through sweat, not conferred. Of two unequally privileged people, one may attend mechanic school, but only the ones who sweat will attain skill.

ccernaf 12y ago
You're ignoring the systematic factors that lead to one person being able to attain car-repairing skills over the other. "Al, in fact, was a former Lamborghini tech. What’s that training worth? Do most poor people have it?" No one is denying that Al probably put in a lot of hard work, but that he was able to get to that point is a part of privilege too.
- diydsp 12y ago
  You seem to claim that privilege will give you skill. It will not. You need sweat to gain skill. Here is a quote from someone who actually became a Lamborghini tech[1]. It supports my statement that sweat is more important than privilege in acquiring skill, emphasis mine: "i did need not go to any toher after school like audi etc. i got perfect attendence and didnt have a grade under 94. i always went to another school at night during my course in high performance engine building. just work hard and when you go to school work hard. more than half the kids sat thier all day talking about cars and didnt care about there grades. and the most important thing you need luck. haha to be honest. i am a technician here on the service side. you never know unless you try. every body told me i was nuts cause i sent about 60 resumes to every top dealer and performance shop that had something to do with lambo and ferrari and all these great companys, and i got it. just work hard and dont give up. my first day at work i got to work on and drive the veyron. it was insane " [1] http://www.lamborghini-talk.com/vbforum/f4/how-become-lamborghini-technician-5790/ http://www.lamborghini-talk.com/vbforum/f4/how-become-lambor...
  - ccernaf 12y ago
    I never claimed that you needed only privilege to gain skill, or that you didn't need sweat to gain skill. What I said was that even those who work hard were able to do so (able to work hard) because of some privilege that they had.

O____________O 12y ago

This is a bit too black and white. The numerous Spanish-speaking men I saw at Autozone at around 10pm on Arizona (the only place I've lived where parts stores were open until 11pm) were good counterpoints[1]. The reality is that it comes down to some combination of know-how, discipline (nobody wants to change an alternator at midnight), resourcefulness, and innumerable other factors. The example in the article -- a failing radiator -- has workarounds that would allow someone to nurse it to and from work. An overworked, single mother of three is pretty unlikely to know the workaround. That said, by all means, buy the newest car you can afford, unless you're specifically seeking a challenge. [1] I noticed that, somewhat ironically, the people in the poorer neighborhoods around Phoenix had the 'privilege' of more parts stores open later.

jethro_tell 12y ago
You also have to amortize tools over multiple cars.

bb0wn 12y ago

Just bought my first new car in November. I tried really hard to get a used car, but honestly, it just didn't make any sense -- the cost of financing was much higher, and the cost of the vehicle itself was nearly as much as a brand new model year (this was the case for both the '15 Toyota Corolla and '15 Honda Civic, and their '11 to '13 model year used counterparts.) This doesn't even touch on how difficult it was to find a decent used car in the first place. I guess if you're comfortable with dropping $10k in cash for a decent used car, then you'd save money, but when/if you can finance a new car for very low interest rates, why tie up your liquid cash like that? > For those families, a new-car payment is a burden — but it’s one they can predict and live with. It sucks to “throw away” $300 or $400 every month, but it’s never a surprise and in exchange they have freedom from surprises. How exactly is paying $300-$400 monthly for a new car "throw away" money? It's going towards the ownership of a useful piece of property. Maybe the author is talking about leasing? I don't know.

phkahler 12y ago
>> How exactly is paying $300-$400 monthly for a new car "throw away" money? It's going towards the ownership of a useful piece of property. Maybe the author is talking about leasing? I don't know. He's talking about the difference between that monthly payment and paying cash for cheap used car and not having the payment. If you spend $2000 on a crappy car that you maintain yourself, that monthly payment seems like throwing money away. The whole point of the piece is that's not even close to the whole story.
edvinbesic 12y ago
Because for some families those $3-400 could be better spent elsewhere so putting it towards a nice new car might seem like a waste, hence the air quotes.
ssharp 12y ago
Low interest rates on new cars are a smoke and mirrors game. If you weren't getting low interest rates, you'd be getting a better cash price. I bought a used car earlier this year and financed it at 3%. I'll pay around $1500 in interest. I save several times that in depreciation, and even new with 0% interest, the price still would have been close to that $1500 more. Also, the decision isn't necessarily between brand new car and a 10k used car. If you're buying a two or three year-old car, it's probably over 10k.

lafar6502 12y ago

Yep, a nice example for comparison. How many of you would buy an used car with a million miles on the clock? Weren't anything with less miles available? Consider the value depreciation of a new car, this will usually be several hundred per month, add more insurance costs, costly servicing (because you can't service it anywhere you want), add financing costs (loan or leasing) and you'll see why everybody wants you to buy a new car. Ten year old car is not really that old, come on, and most of the parts/systems are probably perfectly allright.

anythingian 12y ago

Spending $300 - $400 dollars a month with the idea that you wont have surprises in terms of your 'brand new' transportation is a fallacy. I've seen new cars back in the dealership often times more frequently than used cars with 100k on the clock. Although you may not have to 'pay' for the repairs it is still the inconvenience that you'll have associated with a rental car and the time lost. As another commenter pointed out, these guys posses a skill, it's not just about free time. And the skill can be acquired or bought just like most other skills. Some basic education on how to buy a used car and what to look for can save you big $$$, I wrote about how I pick up sub $5000 cars and why financially it almost never makes sense to buy a new car here: http://www.tropicalmba.com/entrepreneurmobile/ http://www.tropicalmba.com/entrepreneurmobile/ Most cars have a sweet spot in terms of maintenance cost and depreciation. You don't have to go down to the $5000 if you aren't comfortable there. Problem is however that comfort for most uneducated used car buyers is relative and mostly not related to the actual condition of the vehicle. Most people think newer is more reliable. While in many instances that can be the case, IMO it certainly doesn't justify the price that comes with it. For many buyers a good window to consider is 2-6 years old. The vehicle will still be going through it's depreciation cycle (so you will be paying for that) but will generally have somewhere between 20-100k miles on it. In most modern vehicles you probably won't have to repair anything major during a 2-4 year ownership period depending on where your car is in the cycle. It's a good idea to have an ownership timeline for your purchase. I personally like to drive something different every year or two. I know most people like to set it and forget it. Either way, having a plan for ownership length is an important part of the equation and can help you to factor depreciation and mitigating risk. Finally. The Japanese and Germans still build the best vehicles unless you want a truck. It's very unpatriotic but save yourself the headache and don't buy an american car. It's really easy to try and argue this one until you try and remember the last time you saw a mid- nineties Ford Taurus on the road. Same can't be said for a Civic.. The resale prices will corroborate here as well, you may be tempted to jump into a $6000 2008 Chevy Malibu... it's a trap! Poor build quality and low resale potential make these very bad choices.

mncolinlee 12y ago

I know a number of friends who hear the sticker price and think my decision to acquire a Nissan LEAF electric car is an expensive and ridiculous luxury. They're both wrong and right for the same reasons the OP's friend is wrong and right. At the time I bought my car, one study had shown the LEAF as the second cheapest total cost of ownership of all US-sold automobiles after the Toyota Yaris. My own research showed their electric cost assumptions didn't factor in off-peak rates at one-third of normal costs. Even with today's low gas prices, some new electric cars' TCOs can compare favorably against their gas competitors. On the other hand, privilege has to factor in. Range anxiety doesn't matter if you have money. I've never run out of electricity and I can afford to be late to appointments if needed. I can afford the uncertainty of being an early adopter in a cold weather state with fewer chargers because I have alternatives available if needed. Electric cars will become a no-brainer for cost sensitive people in future as ranges increase and used ones become more available. However, my decision only makes sense with some level of privilege.