Driving 'til they drop

Here's an interesting article I came across recently: "Americans Are Driving Their Cars To Death In Order To Save Money."

The article states: "Drivers across the country are increasingly holding onto their cars for longer than ever, with an increasing number hitting more than 100,000 miles in their cars, according to a new report from the Wall Street Journal. The trend comes as drivers realize the savings to be had by simply not replacing their car every five years. ... [T]he average age of a car on U.S. roads has now risen to 12.5 years after six straight years of increases, reports the WSJ. In fact, cars over 10 years old now account for more than 40 percent of the cars on America’s roads. ... But why the sudden desire to hold onto our cars for longer? It all comes down to spiraling repair costs and higher insurance premiums for newer vehicles, according to the WSJ. What was once a simple fix on older models, can now require sensor replacements, new screens and all kinds of electronics fixes that can see the bill at your local shop rise and rise."

This is a subject near and dear to our hearts at the moment because we just finished with a lot of repair work for our older vehicles. Our 30-year-old truck, in particular, was giving us issues ... so many issues that we thought it was time to sell it and purchase a new (used) pickup.

(The photo above is the same make and model as our current, but it's a stock photo. Ours is far more beat up.)

A search through the used-truck market made us realize even a cheap used truck was virtually out of our price range. For the time being, we spent what was necessary to get our older truck to keep going for a few more years.

We know this is not something we can do forever, but man I don't like newer vehicles. Not only are they outrageously expensive, but the repairs are pricey and usually involve computer-driven failures such as sensors or chips rather than mufflers or transmissions. Nor do we like the "spy" technology being programmed into so many vehicles these days. That's why we cling to our beaters and drive them 'til they drop.

So our strategy at the moment is to keep our old truck repaired enough to use, while in the meanwhile saving what we can for the inevitable day when we'll have to purchase a new (used) vehicle.

As a secondary note, when I was thiiiis far pregnant with Younger Daughter (literally two weeks before she was born), Don and I went car shopping for a vehicle that would accommodate child car seats (up until that point, we both owned pickup  trucks). Understand this was back in 1998, and our monthly payments for our new (used) car was $100/month. To a couple of broke young parents, that was a lot of money ... but what was worse was the principle we owed on the vehicle never seemed to go down. Finally we sold my pickup truck and paid off the car, and vowed we would never put ourselves in auto-loan debt ever again. Nor have we.

That's why I found the above-linked article so interesting. Driving older vehicles just makes sense. Just ask our 1990 Ford F150 pickup.

Mechanicking, country style

We had to take our old jeep in for some specialized mechanic work.

We bought this little vehicle five years ago, and it's served us well. However it needed some electrical work (relays, etc.) replaced as well as additional maintenance that were beyond the capacity of our primary mechanic (whose specialty is tires, but who does some mechanic work on the side), so off it went. Yesterday afternoon we got the call the car was fixed and ready to pick up.

The mechanic is a young family man, and he works in a shop on his property, which is located on a lovely stretch of road surrounded by broad meadows. Nice place to raise a family, especially since the dad works at home.

As Don and I crested the hill and crossed the meadow toward the mechanic's home, we saw elk. Lots of elk. Dozens of elk, possibly close to a hundred. I'd never so many elk in one location. With such a broad expanse of meadow, I suppose it's a natural place for them to hang out.

While Don paid for the vehicle, I crept to the edge of the lawn, peered through some bushes, and tried to photograph a few of the animals.

The herd was scattered over several acres, so I could only get a few animals into any single photo at a time.

The animals were calm and unhurried.

We've been in Idaho over 20 years now, and never have I seen such quantity of elk as we've seen around this place. It's delightful.

I followed Don home in the newly repaired vehicle just as the sun set.

Mechanicking, country style. Gotta love it.

An air of desperation

Don was scrolling through our local Facebook Marketplace buy-and-sell last night when he came across a listing for a 2023 Ford F350 truck. The seller wanted $73,000 for it.

"Seventy-three thousand!" exclaimed Older Daughter. "That's the down payment for a house! Let me guess, it has all the bells and whistles."

"Yep." Don started reading the list of amenities: Automatic this, heated that...

"That listing has an air of desperation about it," remarked Older Daughter.

And indeed it did. We started speculating why someone was selling such a brand-new vehicle, clearly barely used. We concluded the only reason someone would part with such a treasure was because of the monthly payments, which doubtless were at least $1,000/month for at least seven years. Was it buyer's remorse? Was it budgetary reality? Did the buyer just lose his job?

We recalled what Younger Daughter had mentioned when she was in boot camp in Great Lakes, Illinois: The number of car dealerships located just off base. Teenagers, newly enlisted and flush with the headiness of a steady paycheck and being away from home for the first time, would buy brand-new vehicles and then get saddled with crushing payments for vehicles they barely had time to drive before they were whisked off to another part of the world or deployed at sea. Madness.

But then, I think it's madness to spend $73,000 on a truck, too, unless the buyer is extremely well off or has a guaranteed job. It could also explain this headline from today: "Subprime Auto Loan Delinquency Erupts, Reaching Highest Rate On Record."

Whatever the reason, we hoped – for the seller's sake – he would find someone able to relieve him of this financial burden. $73,000 is an awful lot of money to owe for a vehicle, especially in these fiscally uncertain times.

Silly but satisfying

I was coming back from town a few days ago when I happened to notice our car's odometer:

Well, whaddaya know. I kept an eye on it as I drove. Next mile up:

I pulled over to take a celebratory photo of the Big Turnover.

Ta da! Silly but satisfying, y'know?

Another one bites the dust

Remember the old song by Queen, "Another one bites the dust"...?



Well, that's what we're experiencing with vehicles. They keep biting the dust.

Younger Daughter's Hundai Santa Fe died in late December. We donated it to the Union Gospel Mission Motors in Spokane Valley. We're huge fans of the Union Gospel Mission (read this to understand why), and try to support them whenever possible.

Anyway, that meant we were down to one vehicle, our Dodge Durango. It's been giving us some trouble, but after pouring $1200 into it in early January, we were confident it would last a while.

It lasted until Tuesday.

On that day, I was driving back from Coeur d'Alene after a day of errands. About halfway home, I suddenly heard BANG clunk clunk clunk clunk clunk etc. This happened on a bridge, so I slowed down, limped off the bridge, and parked on the side of the highway.

An hour later, the tow truck driver arrived and loaded the sad heap of the Durango onto his flatbed. He peered underneath the vehicle. "The transfer case cracked in half," he remarked. "I'll bet that made a helluva loud noise." Yep, it did.

With the Durango on the flatbed, the driver headed down the highway toward home.

Here Don watches as the vehicle is offloaded. Now it, too, has a date with the Union Gospel Mission in the near future.

But meanwhile we were car-less. So this morning we borrowed a neighbor's vehicle and took ourselves into Spokane to go car-shopping.

We had perused the car lot's inventory the night before and narrowed the selection down to two possibilities: a 2004 Jeep Liberty (with 130K miles) and a 2005 GMC Yukon (with 175K miles). After looking over both vehicles carefully, examining their service records and CarFax histories, and test-driving both, we decided the Yukon was just too big (not to mention $1300 more expensive), so we purchased the Jeep Liberty.

While doing the paperwork for the purchase with the salesman, we noticed another salesman whose desk was behind us had an open Bible (Isaiah) on his desk. What a nice sight. It's the kind of place the Union Gospel Mission is.

This vehicle was comically described as "Deep molten red," though I'd say it's more of a plum color. Don drove it home while I drove our neighbor's borrowed vehicle, and he is quite pleased with our purchase.

So there you go. With a little luck (and maintenance), our tidy plum Jeep will last many years and won't be "biting the dust" anytime soon.

How much car can you afford?

I stumbled across an interesting article recently entitled "Find out how much car you can afford with 20/4/10 rule." The idea, it seems, is not to spend too much on vehicles. Consider this passage:

"The 20/4/10 is a good example of one. It can help you get solid starting numbers to help your car buying decisions. Here’s how it works:

• 20% down payment on the car.
• 4-year car loan or less.
• 10% or less of your gross monthly income goes towards car expenses including gas, insurance, DMV fees, repairs, parking/speeding tickets, and interest payments.

Imagine you want to purchase a new car for $30,000 and you earn roughly $50,000 a year. That means you need to put at most a down payment of $6,000 (20% of the cost) and spend no more than $417 a month (10% of your income) on expenses for it."

I found this to be appalling advice, especially coming from a website entitled "I will teach you to be rich." How can you become rich if you "invest" (cough cough) in financially losing strategies by putting yourself in extreme debt for something that does not hold value? Hellooooo?

How's this for a concept: If you earn $50,000/year, you have no business buying a $30,000 car. New cars literally -- literally -- lose half their value the very second the wheels leave the car lot.

If you're trying to be rich, I imagine the first rule of thumb is not to spend money on things you can't afford, especially things that don't hold their value. Foolish people that we are, we buy used but reliable $2000 vehicles for cash and drive them until they fall apart.

Of course, we're not rich, so what do I know? Maybe it's better to listen to the experts.

Q&A session?

A reader just posted the following:

Patrice, this is off subject but would you ever consider a post that just answers questions? We are about to head up to Idaho for our fourth time in as many months and planning a move. But as you wrote that you were driving a 2k car, we are completely ignorant as to what vehicle we need in Northern Idaho. I was assuming a heavy 4 wheel drive but it doesn't sound like that is what you drive. Many other people probably have questions also. Thanks.

Hmmm. This might be an interesting idea. Does anyone have questions they'd like me to answer, to the best of my ability? (I reserve the right not the answer anything I don't want to, LOL. You can't have our bank account number, for example.)

To answer this gentleman's question: We live 1.5 miles off-road, meaning we can easily get snowed in during wintry weather (until some hardworking neighbors team up to plow everyone out). We've always used smallish vehicles that are high-clearance, four-wheel drive, and hatchback (the better for loading chicken feed or wood). Until it died, we had a Hundai Tucson that was the toughest little beast you ever saw. Armed with studded tires and chains, it handled all kinds of hairy road conditions. That said, we also know when to stay home.

While a beefy pickup truck has its uses -- and we have one -- it's impractical for day-to-day driving. My auto preference is for a high-clearance vehicle as opposed to, say, a low-slung sedan. We currently have two inexpensive vehicles, both costing $2000 from used-car lots: a Hundai Santa Fe (technically Younger Daughter's vehicle) and a 2000 Dodge Durango.

Hope this helps.

New wheels

Our car died over the summer.

I can't blame it, really. We have beat the holy tar out of this baby. Years of driving it on our rough pot-hole-y road, through snow and slush and mud, over rocks and ridges, took its toll.

But it was the electrical system that finally gave out, apparently a fault of Hyundais late in their life. A mechanic gave us a quote for repair that made us realize we would be putting more into the car than it was worth.

So there it sat in the driveway for several months, in a nonworking state, while we saved money for another vehicle and drove my brother's car in the meantime. This borrowed vehicle, while we're grateful for its use, is entirely unsuited to our long-term needs, being a low-slung two-wheel-drive sedan.

But what to do with our faithful old car? It somehow seemed heartless to give it to a wrecking yard. So instead we donated it to the Union Gospel Mission in Spokane, an outstanding privately-funded organization which rehabilitates homeless people and helps them acquire life skills.

We knew the car would be repaired (and would teach mechanical skills to someone in the process) then sold (which would financially assist the organization), so we were left feeling pretty good about the fate of our faithful old beastie.

But with winter coming, getting a suitable vehicle for our needs became a priority, otherwise we could find ourselves stranded (our rough dirt road can become difficult to maneuver in winter conditions). Finally this week we felt we had enough cash to go car shopping. Our only requirements: four-wheel drive, high clearance, and a hatchback. Beyond that, we weren't too fussy.

Don looked long and hard at various makes and models, learning what lines had a history of trouble or a tendency toward pricey repairs. He teamed up with a mechanically-inclined neighbor, and on Friday they went to look at a variety of vehicles for sale.

Later, while working in the garden, I saw this car driving down the road:

Could this be it? Turns out, yes. The men were back in a much shorter amount of time than I anticipated, and both were gleeful. After looking at a couple of private-sale cars, it seems they made an impulsive stop in a very small-town car lot which had just one vehicle meeting the above three requirements (four-wheel drive, high clearance, hatchback). Not only was the car in sound mechanical shape, but it was priced at a much lower cost than we had budgeted (which will allow us to purchase studded tires for winter and have a mechanic make any necessary repairs).

So meet our new car: a 2000 Dodge Durango with 170,000 miles. It even has a tow package. It's a bit bigger of a vehicle than we discussed getting, but hey, the price was right and it runs terrific.

Don did a bit of research after the fact -- namely, a CarFax report -- and came away even more pleased than before. This particular vehicle has only had two previous owners; one had it for 13 years, the other less than two. It needed no major repairs, nor did it undergo any trauma (floods, accidents, body damage, etc.). For Dodge Durangos in general, it seems most people are highly satisfied with them.

It won't get the same gas mileage our old Hyundai got, but the fact of the matter is we don't drive that much. It's not like we have a commute. But the times we do drive, we often need cargo capacity (bags of chicken feed, or mineral blocks, or a month's worth of groceries, etc.).

With care, we're hoping to get a good ten or more years out of this baby. I'm thankful Don and our neighbor made that impulsive stop.