New, Used or Neither

I have a 17 yr old Acura Integra with only 61,000 miles on it. It’s starting to need more and more expensive repairs and it’s no longer a comfortable ride. Since I use public transportation and clearly don’t use a car so much should I replace this car with a new car or a good used one? How many miles on a used car would make sense for me? Flex cars and Zip cars are available in my area if I need a more reliable ride maybe I should stick with what I have?

If you can get by without buying another car, you will save tons of money and all other headaches associated with car ownership. I would say sell the Integra and just use zip cars/public transportation.

If you don’t owe on the car, why sell it? If you truly don’t use it often, you aren’t burning through transmissions or other major drive train parts. Use it as a utility vehicle as long as it starts and then junk it. It’s a guarantee that you will spend money if you get rid of it, new car, extra cab rides, Zip car, etc…

Caveat - Don’t plan any road trips with this one.

If you have the option of not owning a car without facing any hardships, I think it makes sense to sell it and save the money you are spending on insurance. If my town had decent mass transit, I would sell my car in a heartbeat.

I would dump it and look for another, newer “beater”…a Focus is cheap if you feel you really need a good car. It’s a personal “freedom” decision and hard to give up. Your call. You could dump your car first, then give yourself a year w/o to see how it works and what adjustments are worthwhile making. Plenty of those “Foci” (plural for focus) out there waiting next year.

My sister was in a similar situation, plus extra cost for a parking spot, she sold hers with the plan to rent one when needed, 2 years and counting she has not rented one yet.

is this car equipped with one of those wonderful and moreover never to be maligned, and quite stupendus timing belts? If so, it is due for a new one. After that, brakes, and if manual transmission, a clutch. All things else being equal, the cost of these repairs will be less than the cost of a new (minimum 14k) or used car in better shape. If you feel you need it, keep it and put the money in to make it last. If you dont need it, sell it and get a bicycle or even a tricycle for those times when you need to pop down to some store or another just a few miles away.

I own 2 cars and I rent cars for long road trips. You can rent pretty cheaply for long weekends, and you can find OK deals with Costco’s website, or if you are near an airport you can get deals with priceline’s bidding process.

Get the car shined up nice, and sell it.

What is not comfortable? If it’s the seats, you can put new foam in them ad even recover the seats while you’re at it. If it’s a harsh ride, replace the struts.

I don’t think there was any other option besides harsh ride in those Integras.