Commuting should I use the newer car or the older car?

Driving/Drivers
21

As is often the case, my view is different. I have parked in McAllen a 2002 Sienna with 220,000 miles on it. I would not hesitate in the summer to drive it to the Arctic ocean. Only known problems are a bad right side mirror and a broken door handle on the right passenger door. Motor and tranny run like new. It would be in front of my house here in the mountains of Mexico, but Mexico decided to violate their NAFTA agreements on importing used cars.

Either of those cars with proper maintenance should run to 200,000 miles or more. Some folks here get well over 300,000 miles on a car without a high failure rate or expensive repairs. At 20,000 miles a year that is a very long time.

But, there is another viewpoint, too. In the 70ā€™s, I decided to try to get the CPA certificate, which I eventually did. Part of my studies included an Investment Analysis course, taught by a young, brilliant professor.

He hammered on the need to consider emotions when making financial decisions. He said there are people who really should bury their money in the basement, because even with their money in the bank, they lie awake at night, worrying about the bank going broke.

And, he said there are people who really should get a mortgage on their house and put every cent on a wild cat oil well. Or, the rest of their lives they will be kicking themselves for not going for broke and taking the big shot at a fortune.

He said one should know oneself, and invest accordingly. However, there is strong peer pressure from those with minimal knowledge of human nature, who try to analyze everything down to the last cent, no matter what it does to a personā€™s sleep patterns.

Though this as an Investment Analysis course, I think one should apply the same attitude to all your important decisions. If you buy a car, based only on a calculator, your life is going to be missing something. I am not saying mortgage your house for a Ferrari. Nor an old NSX like my son-in-law did last year. (No, I donā€™t think he mortgaged his house.) Logically, that $40,000 car made not much sense. But, when there is a car show, there he is having a great time, and sometimes his son goes with him. He has been in harness his whole life, first caring for his mother after his father died applying toxic chemicals on a federal installation without protective gear. Then, helping raise a small son.

He has deserved that personal treat, and my daughter is glad he can make it all work for him without financial risk to the family.

I am not sure all of you will understand this. Money isnā€™t everything.

I remember once some years ago I was on a Yahoo forum for the company we retired from. And, I referred to accountants as bean counters. A low level accountant was offended and said he was offended by such an insult, that he was proud of being an account. I told him I am a CPA, and yet in my observation, most accountants are truly no more than bean counters, concerned only with cents and dollars, and miss a lot of important stuff.

22

When looking at it this way, one has to consider that one vehicle is 15 to 16 years old ( 2002 Subaru Outback Sport) and the other is 6 to 7 years old (2011 Honda CR-Z).

The age clock is running out on the Subaru. Some car parts become problematic with age. Rubber seals, gaskets, interior parts, etcetera donā€™t improve with advanced age, in fact no parts do. That car is way below average on miles/year.

Save it? For what a historical museum? It has already been saved for too long. Itā€™s best to ā€œuse upā€ the old car before it develops age related issues, just as one would use the old milk in the refrigerator before opening the new bottle.
CSA

2 Likes
23

You guys have all provided a great number of arguments on both sides of the fence for which I am very grateful.
While Iā€™m not convinced one can reliably get more than 150,000 miles out of a car or if you would want to when you have to pay someone else for the repairs. But then I regularly totaled my high mileage cars before they quite reached that point (i was young I had some exceptionally bad driving days)

My husband driving the manual Subie through logjam traffic could result in him attempting to rip the gear shift off in frustration but we arenā€™t saving it for a history museum. And since he has owned the subie I have had two del sols 93&97, a 97 tacoma, a 06 mini, and the cr-z (sold the del sol to walk dogs in the truck, stop walking dogs so bought a del sol, del sol had been a tuner car with weird electrical issues so got the mini which was built by drunken monkeys out of paper mache used the money not used to replace the mini which was broken again to buy a used CR-Z) I did to trade the mini in for a newer car for him and to claim the subie but he said no.

And you have some great points irlandes, some of the most important. when you spend money on a car be in 3k or 300k you need to make that decision based on who you are, not a calculator. One of the best pieces of advice i ever got was donā€™t forget how important the color is. If every time you walk out and look at your car and it is your favorite color vs some color that you think is meh you will get far more enjoyment out of that vehicle my kermit green del sol made my heart sing every time I looked at it and if i hadnā€™t used a calculator to estimate how much it cost just to sit in the driveway while I walked dogs with the truck I would probably still have it.

There is no reason he even has to drive the same car every day.
Regardless you have all been awesome in giving ammo to both sides of the argument so the hubby and I can talk it out and decide together who drives what where