HELP!!! I need car advice - stressing.

[Uno-Mom]

Basic question: would you put $800 into a car repair for a 16 year old car, worth less than $1500?

Seems obvious, huh? It doesn't feel obvious. Here's the background:

This is my Escort wagon, it's reliable and inherited from my parents who bought it new. I know it seems silly mathematically but maybe fixing it's a better risk than buying used right now...

We have a reasonable income but are fighting to pay off our student loans. We have 5K in savings. Taking out an auto loan is NOT something we'd consider, since we're killing ourselves to get out of debt. Simply put: the max we'd spend on a used car would be 3-4K and using our hard-won savings for that would break our hearts!

So if the alternative was buying an unknown used car for 4K, vs fixing my current one - what do you think?

(I sound all calm when I write this, but really I'm freaking out! When you're scrimping pennies, a stupid thing like this can really throw you. Also, I'm home sick today so I'm feeling even more miserable. Waah. Waah. I hate being a grownup today.)

[niccig]

Talk to your mechanic and get an idea for the condition the car is in and what might be needed to do down the road. $800 once is fine, but if you're going to have another $800 in a few months, then that's not ideal, it'll use up all your savings too.

[sariana]

My first question (being the cynic that I am) is: Does it really need the $800 repair? Can you trust that estimate? Is it possible to do a smaller repair for less and do without some feature?

What is wrong with the car? I had an old diesel years ago that started to run really slowly. A mechanic told me it had mold in the fuel pump and needed to be cleaned out (for some large amount of money, I'm sure).

It really just needed a new lever. Which wasn't very expensive.

So...does your car really need an $800 repair?

If so, then I would say yes, do it. You know this car. You wouldn't know what you were getting with a "new" used car.

[Kindra178]

I've have always heard that if the repair is cheaper than the value of the car, do it. In your case, the repair is cheaper, and your car is a known entity (ie the devil you know). That $800 might buy you another year. Next year you may be in a better financial situation.

[dogmom]

I've have always heard that if the repair is cheaper than the value of the car, do it. In your case, the repair is cheaper, and your car is a known entity (ie the devil you know). That $800 might buy you another year. Next year you may be in a better financial situation.

Yes, do that. I declined to replace and engine in a 8 yo 150K car, which was sort of a wash. But I had to think about it a lot. For $800 I would go for it. If it buys you one more year of no car payments it is worth it and you know how the car was cared for.

[JustMe]

My first reaction was "of course not", but after reading more of your op, I can see why it makes sense. I agree with others to talk to your mechanic to see if these repairs would hold you for a good. long while and if its likely they will, I can see why it would make sense. Used car prices are very high right now.

[Uno-Mom]

I've have always heard that if the repair is cheaper than the value of the car, do it. In your case, the repair is cheaper, and your car is a known entity (ie the devil you know). That $800 might buy you another year. Next year you may be in a better financial situation.

Your post made me chuckle, thinking of my uber-dull Escort wagon as having devilish qualities. Heh heh.

Thanks for the suggestions, everybody! That's a good point, about used prices being so high.

When you calculate an old car's worth ... do you think only of resale? Because of a big dent, our resale would be very low. But if you caluculate just based on make, model, and engine health, it's worth more to us.

Some specifics: there's a coolant leak deep in the engine. Most of the cost would come from moving engine parts to access the leak. I do, honestly, trust our mechanic. He's saved us a lot of cash over the years. He couldn't actually say it, but hinted that repairing the car wouldn't make sense. I need to talk with him more, though. Obviously he isn't privy to all our financial details and why this is the wrong moment for us to buy a car.

Right now he's putting some sort of temporary patch in there, in hopes that it will buy us time. He warned that I need to check coolant levels every couple days or so, though.