I always go for the reliable brand. My daughter got rear-ended and a totaled car. She wanted to replace it with a small hatchback. It came down to a used Fit or Prius. She did have just 8K to spend though.
I’m impressed she was about to buy a decent Prius for $8K, @GTalum. The initial price for those vehicles new is much higher.
Thanks everyone. You’ve all been very helpful!
It is @HImom’ I was surprised to. But, it seems in this area, buying a used Prius vs a Corolla or Civic and particularyly a Fit (which don’t seem to depreciate much) is only about 1-2 thousand dollars different. New, I’m not sure a Prius is worth the extra cost over the Fit. I think people worry about the battery failing and stay away from the used hybrids.
10 yrs ago we bought a 2 yr old mercedes C class with 20,000 miles for $22,000. It is now 12 yrs old and has 200,00 miles. Other than 2 items that were covered under factory warranty, we have not had any major repairs. It was certified through the dealer, 1 owner and we have enjoyed the car so much.
The most economical car long term (that you can still find) are Toyota Corollas. You will tire of this car long before it need to go to the junkyard.
@thumper1 I am so jealous, I miss my 1995 Volvo 850. At 192k miles, I could not find anyone who could fix it and it became too dangerous to drive. :((
I have always purchased used cars that are highly rated and have never been disappointed. I feel like I have ended up with “nicer” cars this way - more comfortable, more features - etc. I just can’t bring myself to pay what I would have to in order to get it new. You will pay more for certified, but it can be worthwhile. If you are patient, you can often find one that has low mileage as well.
I had a Corolla and would buy another. I drove the new model (loaner from dealer) and was thoroughly impressed at the content and ride at that price point.
@LeastComplicated, our 1999 Camry has seen better days. We were talking about this to our daughter and she said that Toyota has brought back the Yaris Sedan~$15K. My dd2 has a 2009 Yaris. It’s cheap, bare bones, but really reliable and it was driven back and forth from California to Buffalo NY and from southern California to Northern California (9 hour trips) multiple times.
Go to Edmunds.com online to get the actual price of whatever you plan on buying.
We are on our third Volvo Sedan. The first was an OLD 240 maybe? LAte 1980 something. It lasted for years…many years. We actually donated that one to charity and bought an off lease 2000 s70. Loved that car. I drive it until 2014, then DD drove it…then we sold it to a friend! It only just recently went to the great beyond.
I now have a 2012 S60. I love the car. But it did have a little engine oil burning issue. Volvo dropped a brand new engine in it about 6 months ago. I’m hoping to have this car as long as my previous two volvos.
What I really want is their small SUV…not going to happen!
H is on his 3rd Volvo. We had a 1984 Volvo and finally donated it to a neighbor and bought a 1998 S70 from BIL. The paint started failing, so our mechanic swapped out the best of that car with an identical that had a good body but troubled engine. H expects to continue to drive this for many, many years.
I think this is only true if you pay full sticker or substantially above invoice.
There is so much information out there now about invoice/retail prices, and every dealer around here has an internet department, that there is no reason to pay much of anything above invoice.
The last three cars I’ve bought consisted of emailing the dealers asking for their best price for the model I want. You can usually see the exact model and equipment on their web site. All three were within $100 of invoice.
As a result, the deal was negotiated and the price was set before even stepping foot into the dealership.
Then you just need to be a little firm to resist some up-selling for extended warranties and what-not. Even that’s pretty easy because you will have one or more offers from other dealers in your pocket and you can easily walk if they annoy you too much.
Yes you can come out ahead buying used if you are willing to do a private party transaction, but there is a lot of risk because there is nothing standing behind the purchase.
I’ve also found that “certified pre-owned” can add $2000 to the price. It’s essentially an extended warranty built into the price. If you are getting a car with a history of reliability you can save this and you will most likely be ok.
Our neighbors wanted a used car but found the Honda Fit new was cheaper, so that’s what they bought.
We’ve bought our kids used cars in the past, usually with pretty high mileage. We always got a Carfax to make sure we knew the history.
We bought our D2 a Camary with close to 100,000 miles. She drove it for over 5 years and traveled many thousands of miles. We bought a new car and sold one of our newer, much lower mileage cars to her. We used the13 year old Camery as a trade in ( it was actually always under our name). We found out the salesman that sold us our new car bought the Camery for his D. Haha.
The moral of the story-- if buying used, check Carfax and buy a quality brand.
If I have to buy a car now I will buy an old one to use in the next 3-5 years. Then I will sell it and buy a new car.
I will wait for new car technology to help reducing accidents when I am retired.
Since you say that buying cars makes you a wreck, I’d say get a certified pre-owned with warranty used car from the dealer, or a new car. Repairs are exorbitantly expensive on most cars now, and you don’t know what’s lurking under the hood unless you really know cars, and even then it’s a bit of a crap shoot which car will develop which problems.
We have one CPO car (so far has earned its money’s worth on the warranty with lots of little things fixed as it ages), one I bought new with an extended warranty (that I just used to get a NEW ENGINE at 82k miles, omg), and a 10 yo one out of warranty. That one took months to find (one owner, all records, cream puff), and a lot of patience.
Incidentally, it stopped shifting correctly yesterday and we limped it into the shop. With 125k miles on it, we’re kind of dreading what the diagnosis is (it’s the girls’ car). But, for three years it was pretty darn near perfect (especially since we bought it with 99k miles on it).
As for what brand/kind, safety and weight come first. We drive big, heavy cars with 5 star safety ratings. Too many bad drivers out there. We had a Corolla for a long time-that thing just would not die and I finally made my husband trade it in on a car that had an automatic transmission. Shifting in stop and go traffic was no fun.
If the girls’ car ends up being too expensive to fix, I might trade it in on a Mazda CX-3. It seems to be a good balance of safety and affordability. That or a 2011 C Series mercedes that’s about 17k.
Actually, now that I type it, it’s really likely I’ll stick with used mercedes-they’ve been really good to us over the years. The car with the blown engine at 82k is a Ford. I love it, but the minute it’s out of warranty it’s gone.
So, to answer your question, having owned new cheap cars (and appreciated them for their cheapness and cost to maintain, but not liking them for their cheapness and lack of safety), and expensive used cars, we tend to buy the expensive used cars (at the same price point as the cheap new cars). If you give me 20k to spend I’m going to go used every time.
I bought a Kia Forte5 (similar to Hyundai Elantra hatchback) for $15K (about 70% of the sticker price) last year with power everything-cruise-etc, mainly because it was a 2016 being sold in the fall so there were a lot of manufacturer rebates and I was able to stack them. 6 yr/60K everything warranty and 10 yr/100k powertrain warranty that this particular dealer extends to as long as I own the car.
So it was brand new, but the dealer wanted to get ready for the 2017s so it was a deal.
I drove a lot of different cars, used and new, and it was the most bang for the buck for me at that time. I still really like it, I can fold down the seats and throw a bicycle in the back,a ton of camping gear - even sleep back there, on a foam mattress, when camping.
Well, we took the plunge today and our NEW red Toyota Corolla LE is in the garage. We test drove five used certified cars that I had researched - one a 2015 with only 7K miles on it. Then, when we were going to make our final decision on which used car to select, I asked the salesman just out of curiosity what the difference would be between the price of the 2015 and a brand new 2017 model - mainly so I could gloat about much money we would be saving by buying used. He had to ask his manager, of course, and the price for a new car was only 2K more that the price we feel we could have negotiated for the 2015 (On paper the price difference was only $100 difference between the two, but we hadn’t started haggling to try to get the price down on the 2015 yet - I had done research on the BB value of the 2015 and it was about $2K less than they were asking). So we decided that $2K more wasn’t that much to pay for a full warranty brand new car - our first in probably 25 years. The final price total price was $16K. Husband is happy, so I’m happy. It’s pretty basic, cloth no power seats, but it has the backing safety feature, and tons of airbags and drives really smooth. It’s supposed to hit 100 degrees here tomorrow, so we got it in the nick of time as our other car’s AC has been dead since last summer (it’s a 2008 silver PT cruiser with purple flames with heated power leather seats and a moonroof) and my hub has been refusing to spend the $1,500 to fix it as the car is only worth $3K. We’ll get it fixed eventually though, 'cause it’s a perfect starter car for our soon to be 16 year old. Thanks to everyone that helped us in making this decision!
H’s car was totaled in an accident recently. We always buy used and drive them until the repairs become too costly (or they get totaled …). We decided to buy new for the first time since BC (before children). Yesterday, we signed on the dotted line for a Chevy Equinox … it’s big enough so we can haul our stuff back & forth to the family cottage. After H’s employee discount, the rebates, and a little bargaining we got it for $6k less than sticker price (which ended up being the price we had decided we wanted to pay before we even left the house). The dealership has a 2-year deal where they will cover the deductible up to $500 in case of an accident if you take it there for repairs, so we can increase our deductible on our way-overpriced insurance policy for this vehicle (Michigan insurance is by far the highest in the U.S.).
We decided on new because we are a few years from retirement & figure this will last us into retirement (H takes excellent care of our cars & can do many of his own repairs - the bonus of 41 years as an engineer for an auto manufacturer).
To add to what was said above about this only applying if you pay full or close to full price - my question is, if you’re not going to turn around and sell the car right away, what does it matter? It’s not like you can go out and buy a 1-month old car for far less. And if I buy a 2 year old car and it runs for 8 years vs. brand new for 10 - it pretty much levels out at that point.
I keep cars on average 10 years. The cars I buy are mid-price models that hold their value well - so I’ve had the same experience as some others, where the difference between buying new and buying gently used was minimal. In one case, there had been a significant upgrade to safety the prior model year, so the new car was cheaper to insure than a 2 or 3 year old model, and I felt better teaching my kids to drive in a car with more safety features.
What matter is what you pay over the lifetime of the car - total cost of purchase, property tax costs, cost to insure, gas, repairs, and so on. Resale usually isn’t a big deal for me - if a car still has some life on it I find someone who needs it and sell it cheap or donate. For me and the types of cars I buy and my driving habits, buying new has always made more sense.
That said, when we had the option to buy my mother’s 2013 Civic off lease - with 3,000 miles on it - we jumped at it.
Later in life I may find myself going for the luxury, but right now with kids in college it’s just not the time. I paid $20K for a brand new Camry that gets 38 mpg and I have a local mechanic who can do maintenance work cheap. Works for me!