Voices from Catland is the personal site of Kenn Wilson, sometimes known as Kenn Christ, of San Francisco, California.
I bought a new car this week. Yes, another one. Now that I’m taking BART to work I’ve found that I’m driving my car maybe twice a week, mostly just to run errands locally. Why continue paying $300/month, plus insurance, for a car I never drive?
So I looked around a little and found a 1995 Civic EX for sale last weekend and picked it up for $4,000 cash. It’s only had two owners, has maintenance records going all the way back to 1995, and runs great. It could use a little minor body work, but I’ll probably get it painted later anyway, so that’s not important. What is important is that as soon as I sell my other car, I will once again be completely debt-free.
Selling my other car is going to be problematic though. Due to delays at the DMV, I still don’t have plates and registration for it. My next payment isn’t due until January 12. I would like to sell it before then, but I may not be able to if I don’t get my stuff from the DMV soon. The other problem is that because I haven’t had the car very long, I still owe more than its blue book value. The disadvantage to buying from a dealer rather than a private party is that even if the original price of the car isn’t bad (admittedly, it could have been better), after taxes, licensing, etc, you sometimes end up paying a fair amount more than the car itself is worth (in terms of resale value). I’ve only made a couple payments so far and haven’t had time to knock the outstanding amount down significantly, so I may end up having to take a little bit of a loss when I sell it. That sucks now, but I’ll be saving a ton of money in the long term, so it doesn’t bother me as much as it otherwise might.
Comments
shadyl
December 12, 2004
Seeing that really makes me miss my old Civic. :( It was a ‘94 EX 4 Door. I guess you had seen it when we both still lived out in the L.A. area. I would still like to kick the ass of the woman who totaled it.
But that looks and sounds like a good one. And it really does make a lot more sense than putting a bunch of money into a newer car that you aren’t driving. Which is the same reason why we haven’t looked for a 2nd car since I take the train, too. But if I do decide we need another one, I’m pretty sure I’ll be looking for a version of my old car. Best damn car ever.
Kenn Christ
December 14, 2004
Of course I remember your old car, the one with the Tux sticker on it :)
Best damn car ever.
Seriously, Hondas run forever. I don’t think there’s another car I would feel comfortable buying with 130,000 miles already on it, even for this price. That’s about what my Accord had when I sold it to you, wasn’t it? The car I was driving before that was a 1990 Prelude that was still running at 200,000 miles. I still had enough faith in that car that I was willing to sell it to a friend after I got the Accord.
Something to say?
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