Should we buy this car or not????? v.storywithin

6SpeedTA95 · 07-27-2006, 05:09 PM

My wife drives about 52 miles each way to work. Round trip 104 miles per day. Her toyota rav4 gets 23 or so mpg, we've been trying to find a civic for awhile and haven't found anything that meets our requirements, namely cheap with a manual transmission. Everything in the sub 5k range has had 120, 150, 180k miles. The one I found a cuople weeks ago was 8988, it was a 1998 and had 80k miles. It's a 5 speed manual and is supposedly in fantastic shape. The dealer contacted me today telling me the car was still available and the price was dropped to 6988 and so we decided to go look at it saturday.

It looks like this car will save us 98 dollars in gas at current prices each month. If gas goes up or down obviously that would fluctuate, but the Civic gets 36mpg compared with the 23 or 24 she gets now. A noticable improvement, furthermore the civic would be a quieter car that requires less maintenance. So the question is assuming this car checks good saturday morning do we buy it? It'll require a car payment for probably 12 months or so. Or I can just pay cash for it and deplete our savings. I wont deplete our savings so we'll probably have a payment for 12 to 18 months.

Thoughts on this?

motivez · 07-27-2006, 06:19 PM

The question is will it save you money in the long run enough so to justify the cost of the car.

How did you get 98/month? Weekend driving?

The car costs 7000
She drives 105 miles a day.

Rav 4: At 23 miles per gallon, she's using about 4.56 gallons of gas per day or about $13.25 per day (with gas at ~2.90)

5 day work week = $66.25 a week, or $265 a month, $3180 a year.

Civic: At 36mpg, she's using about 3 gallons of gas a day, or $8.70 a day (with gas at ~2.90)

5 day work week = $43.5 a week, $174 a month, $2088 a year.

That doesn't include any weekend driving or anything that's not to work and back.

--

So, each year (assuming gas prices stay relatively the same), you'll be saving $1092. In order for that to pay off the car at $7000, she'd have to drive it for 6.5 years.

That'd go down obviously depending on weekend/non work driving, etc.. and doesn't factor in maintenance, and obviously isn't a rough estimate since the car isn't always going to be getting 36 MPG.. and maybe my gas price estimate is too high.

6SpeedTA95 · 07-27-2006, 06:23 PM

Originally Posted by motivez

The question is will it save you money in the long run enough so to justify the cost of the car.

How did you get 98/month? Weekend driving?

The car costs 7000
She drives 105 miles a day.

Rav 4: At 23 miles per gallon, she's using about 4.56 gallons of gas per day or about $13.25 per day (with gas at ~2.90)

5 day work week = $66.25 a week, or $265 a month, $3180 a year.

Civic: At 36mpg, she's using about 3 gallons of gas a day, or $8.70 a day (with gas at ~2.90)

5 day work week = $43.5 a week, $174 a month, $2088 a year.

That doesn't include any weekend driving or anything that's not to work and back.

--

So, each year (assuming gas prices stay relatively the same), you'll be saving $1092. In order for that to pay off the car at $7000, she'd have to drive it for 6.5 years.

That'd go down obviously depending on weekend/non work driving, etc.. and doesn't factor in maintenance, and obviously isn't a rough estimate since the car isn't always going to be getting 36 MPG.. and maybe my gas price estimate is too high.

Since her car is worth about 4k its only a 3k difference we have to make up...I used 3 bucks a gallon 2100 miles/mo

motivez · 07-27-2006, 06:26 PM

Well, she'd only have to drive it for about 2 years in that case if you can get 4k for your car..

I'm sure she'd be driving it at least that long, and then you'd be making back more than what you paid on it. It'd be worth it in that case. 6 and a half is a little long, but I forgot to factor in the price of selling the car

..thought you might be trading it in or some such and including that in the full price

motivez · 07-27-2006, 06:33 PM

What year is it btw?

6SpeedTA95 · 07-27-2006, 06:41 PM

It's a 1998

Ardentfrost · 07-27-2006, 06:44 PM

Will it need work? Do you expect the '98 to break down at all in the next X years before you make up the cost? What is your current and expected maintainence costs?

6SpeedTA95 · 07-27-2006, 07:09 PM

Originally Posted by Ardentfrost

Will it need work? Do you expect the '98 to break down at all in the next X years before you make up the cost? What is your current and expected maintainence costs?

Maintenance costs should be about the same or a bit cheaper on the Honda.

Ardentfrost · 07-27-2006, 07:23 PM

Originally Posted by 6SpeedTA95

Maintenance costs should be about the same or a bit cheaper on the Honda.

Seems to me that if everything will be cheaper (gas and maintainence) and you can make up your cost in, what was it? 2 years? then you have made a decent investment.

WickedLou9 · 07-28-2006, 10:13 AM

Don't forget about insurance costs. They will probably go down as well.

6SpeedTA95 · 07-28-2006, 01:42 PM

Originally Posted by WickedLou9

Don't forget about insurance costs. They will probably go down as well.

I could call them, in fact I'll do that now

6SpeedTA95 · 07-28-2006, 01:47 PM

civic = 6 bucks cheaper a year

archangel003 · 07-28-2006, 04:03 PM

Civic can nevar lose.

I would get it. Manual Civics are bulletproof, and gas prices are probably never going to come down ever again.

Publius · 07-28-2006, 06:21 PM

Originally Posted by archangel003

Civic can nevar lose.

I would get it. Manual Civics are bulletproof, and gas prices are probably never going to come down ever again.

i

my Civic, 33mpg even when I beat the shit out of it.

motivez · 07-28-2006, 06:40 PM

Did you get any pics yet?

...of the wife?

archangel003 · 07-28-2006, 10:39 PM

Originally Posted by Publius

i my Civic, 33mpg even when I beat the shit out of it.

31 MPG in the GTI, and it's a turbo so I would rape you.

Publius · 07-29-2006, 04:50 PM

Originally Posted by archangel003

31 MPG in the GTI, and it's a turbo so I would rape you.

but it's a GTI which makes you

6SpeedTA95 · 07-29-2006, 06:01 PM

Didn't get the civic, was ready to buy it, got down there and their story just wasn't sounding right.

motivez · 07-29-2006, 06:03 PM

Further details are required.

6SpeedTA95 · 07-29-2006, 06:10 PM

Originally Posted by motivez

Further details are required.

Basically they said it was a good car, well maintained and was owned by their master mechanics daughter. Got down there, I tended to believe that because they had dealer advertising on the car which they typically wouldn't put on a car. But the bit about being well maintained seemed to more untrue the more time we spent with the car.

The timing belt wasn't done at 60k like it was supposed to be, the guy said he thought it was 90k...well shit thats important on an interference motor because if the belt breaks the engine breaks, yet he didn't do it

but I Figured ok I can get that done if the rest of the car is good. The wife drove it and then I did. When I was driving I noticed the car pulled to the right relatively hard and that any steering to the left was initially numb with no resistance. The first inch to the left that you turned the wheel it was that way. So I was thinking ok either the alignment is horrible or the rack and pinion is having some issues. Alignment = easy, rack and pinion = 800 bucks...they had their front end specialist look at it and he said it was the "tow out" so I said ok. Well again if it was sooo well maintained then why the hell is their so much basic shit that wasn't attended too? It's just not adding up...the guy then proceded to tell me I didn't know what a good driving car felt like and tried to tell me how cars behave on the road. I didn't tell him that I passed my mechanics certification tests or that I drove SCCA for a couple years

I just let him blab. So at that point I realized they were being totally stupid. I also figured it was possible the car was wrecked and wasn't showing up on the carfax because the guy was indeed master mechanic. His daughter slapped a pole, he had it towed to the dealership body shop and fixed it. No reports to the DMV = no accidents on the VIN reports.