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Me_irl (thelemmy.club)
submitted 3 weeks ago by to c/me_irl@lemmy.world
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[–] 12 points 3 weeks ago (7 children)

My mom lives in a retirement community, and some people have some real money. She was at the pool, and one couple was saying they needed to buy a new car because they had a flat tire, and they were told they needed all four. They didn't know how to buy 4 tires, so they decided to buy a new car instead.

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  • [–] 15 points 3 weeks ago (4 children)

    I had a manager who told me that he and his wife both bought new cars every year. He said this while lecturing me for requesting time to take my car to the shop.

    When I said I couldn't afford a new car, his response was that he and his wife saved so much in repair bills, they couldn't afford not to.

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  • [–] 6 points 3 weeks ago (1 child)

    I mean, that's kinda true?

    If you drive sub 1000€ shit boxes its literally cheaper to sell them to export once the TÜV runs out than to get them into an acceptable state

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  • [–] 1 point 2 weeks ago

    Where I live, I don't think there are any cars sold new for a price that low. I don't think we have that kind of export market, either.

    Where are your cars exported to that people are willing to pay so much for a car that needs so much work?

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  • [–] 4 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (1 child)

    I've always managed to save money doing repairs myself...

    Since he does this with two cars, you can probably find a good deal on a used car and spend less in 10 years, on both the car and repairs, than this guy loses in 1.

    Seems that annual repair/maintenance costs on a car range between $400-$1200, over 10 years, that's $4000-$12000.

    Looks like a new car loses about 12.5-20% value in the first year. So for two $35k cars, for him and his wife, dude loses ~$8800-$14000 in one year. Assuming he probably trades it in, I'd bet its on the higher end of that range. And since the average cost of a new car is $48k, he probably loses more (an additional $3200-$5200 per year). Say he does this for 10 years, that's $88,000-$140,000 (+$32,000-$52,000) he wastes. Nobody spends anywhere near that over the lifetime of a car (average being ~16 years) in repairs. Even if he somehow manages to do much better than these estimates, dude is legit an idiot.

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  • [–] 1 point 3 weeks ago

    Alternate take: he could be a really shrewd buyer and good at selling privately.

    Probably not, but it's possible. I knew a guy whose hobby was entirely cars. Shopping for them, going through financing details, and sometimes buying them. He'd bolt on some mods and seemed to have a knack for finding buyers. He'd sometimes sell for more than the total amount he'd put into the vehicle.

    He had almost no real understanding of cars. At most, he could do an oil change and slap on a K&N filter. But goddamn did that guy ever understand how to manipulate financing to his advantage.

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