Ding Dong

[beetiger]

...the car is dead. Apparently the warning light about the oil was actually trying to tell me something. The engine has seized entirely, making it more or less useless. Even with a used engine, the cost of replacing it would probably be $3K or so, which with a blue book value of perhaps $2500 isn't really worth it.

Sorry Julia.

I'm trying to decide if I can actually convince myslef to take better care of the car I've been thinking of buying myself for a while, since the Prius is likely to be pickier than average, or if I'd really be better off buying something used and cheap but sufficient to get me to work safely. I can technically afford the new car, but it's unclear whether I should go that route.

Sympathy and car-buying suggestions encouraged. Any comments on what I should have done with my other car distinctly not encouraged.

Comments

[jenett]

Much sympathy.

Re: ideas: I adore my Saturn, not least because they generally have excellent maintainance records, and because dealing with the maintainance has so far (had my Creature 2.5 years so far) been extremely painless. (She also starts well in the winter, drives well (with anti-lock brakes and traction control) in winter, and a bunch of other good things.

I will, however, refrain from burbling further unless you're interested in more details. :) Creature is a 2000 SL2, which they've just phased out in favor of the Ion, I think it is.

[genders.livejournal.com]

My sympathy for your loss.

My mechanic recommend the Toyota Camry and the Honda Civic for girls who aren't too picky about routing maintenance...

[en-ki.livejournal.com]

Corolla. Preferably driven by a little old lady.

If you want to be half-assed about maintenance, get a ridiculously common breed of car so that you can always find parts in the wild, and get a cheap car so you don't cry too much when it dies.

[aynjel.livejournal.com]

*hughughug* My Hyundai did sort of the same thing back in college.

I love my Honda. And they're pretty reliable and the Civics aren't terribly expensive if you wanted to go that route.

[freeko.livejournal.com]

*hugs*

[tuftears.livejournal.com]

Sympathy hugs! I'm reasonably happy with my Toyota Camry, though it's never been the 'jump with joy for driving' sort of car for me. I enjoyed having a Ford Probe with a V6 engine for a while, but well, that got rather totalled in an accident so I went with a slightly bigger but much safer car.

Pondering my next purchase too. My next purchase will have a DVD GPS navigation system, darnit. I hate getting lost.

[sapphire-d.livejournal.com]

I rather like my Hyundai Elantra, but if you're still driving ungodly amounts from work and home and all of that every day, I'd go for the Hyundai Accent or one of the little shoebox cars that are meant for delivery and get good gas mileage. The delivery Accents at work scare me, they have a lot of power (comparatively) and are cute little puttputtzoom cars. :)

[orleans.livejournal.com]

Much sympathy for the auto. ... As for recommendations, since you don't seem to be a person who likes tinkering around with engines, at least from your post above, I'd recommend a Toyota Tercel (if going used), or a Toyota Echo with the new car. They are inexpensive, robust, and need minimal maintenance. However, with an older used car like a Tercel from the mid 90s, I would recommend a stickshift, as the possibility of automatic transmission failure is always a problem with older cars.

[cloverr.livejournal.com]

As I've said before, you definately have my car-sympathies. I think we feel very similarly about automobiles and the cursed necessity of driving them. Sigh. I just ran up my Visa another 460$ yesterday with car maintenance--70,000 mile transmission maintenance, serpentine belt changed, a tire replaced, and some other dinky stuff that needed to be done and helped run up the total. Gee, you know what though?--the diagnostic the Saturn mechanic ran didn't really show up anything about the electrical system or looking like the car had any serious work done to it recently. Sigh.

[meallanmouse.livejournal.com]

We bought a Ford Focus (hatchback four door) right before Christmas. Went from owning a Jeep TJ to that.

I love that car now... it's really not the same winter drive, but I like the feel of it quite a bit. Just wish they made them in 4 wheel drive, but that's me being picky. Heh.

[read-alicia.livejournal.com]

My 1995 Jetta 3 GL hit 150000 miles last week. My family has always had Volkswagons, mostly Jettas, and they've been very good to us, usually crapping out aroun 200,000.

-Pumette

The other tack:

[orb2069.livejournal.com]

I saw a book once that suggested the exact opposite tack - Buy junkers at dirt-cheap prices by waving cash in people's face(Like, half what they want, in $50 bills), and do NO maintenance on them, at all, other than gas. Buy two, and keep one available as a spare. Sell your corpses in the paper or to junkyards.

The author claimed it was actually cheaper than most other methods of owning a car, as long as you did NO maintenance at all. No experience here to agree or deny with on that count, though.

The Prius seems neat - I haven't seen that they require significantly more maintenance than regular cars, though.