Car- What would you do?

[disykat]

Seriously? New tires. I'm sure everyone else has said the same thing. Hang on to that Accord!

Also, if you REALLY want to give up $400 a month for the next 5 years... put that money into savings for the next car. That way you can buy it outright when the Accord finally does need to be replaced.

This is a really good point! If you have the money for a new car payment, start a "car" category in your budget. There might be months that money goes to new tires, etc. but in general it will make the cash buy a possibility when the time comes!

 

[ssawka]

But you are paying much more for maintenance at a dealer than you are saving in tires....


I've never bought a Japanese car with less than 84,000 miles. 84,000 miles on a Toyota or Honda is far better than a Ford or GM new off the lot. I made the mistake of buying a new Ford instead of a used Honda for my wife. I have a pile of cash in repairing this one new Ford than I've ever had repairing all of my Japanese cars combined.

Not really! Not around here anyway. I used to take my previous car to a garage and the cost was about the same. Besides, I would continue to take the car to the dealer while it is still under warranty, just so there is no question as to whether or not maintenance was performed. Given that Kia's powertrain warranty is 100K, I seriously doubt I'll ever take it anywhere else. Besides, the dealer also has free oil changes for life, so the only thing I'll be paying for is the major periodic maintenance (30K, 60K, 90K, etc.) and possibly tire rotation.