If you don't have a car . . .

Why doesn’t he just buy a car ?

you can still find good used cars for not a lot of money , if you know what to look for .

 

We just recently fired a "homeless" driver who hired on, drove a tractor around the Dallas metro for a weekend full of "homies" for 400 plus miles, ran over some wire and tore the rear tires and wheels up, parked the tractor in the Ft Worth yard... and told us that he couldn't be away from the shelter after midnight due to check in requirements.. (I think it was a halfway house)

 

The average used car in the US is now 29k.. Im sure you can find others for less.. but most of these people don't have the money to get to an orientation and pay for their own food. Trucking is full of people about to financially starve to death

 

If that's true you would think people would take the job more seriously and not fill their wagon full of homies and go joy riding.

 

Yikes

We just bought a 10 yr old car for the wife with 42k on it , it stickered for $26k in 2010, we paid $8k and I thought that was high .

I think we’ve paid more than $8k , maybe once for a vehicle since we got married 27 years ago .

I bought a 2002 4wd suv two years ago , high miles but one owner with all Maint records, for $500

and the person we sold it to the next day for $900 is still driving it .

bought a full size V8 4wd suv two years ago from the original owner who bought it new in 2006 , and had all Maint records , 80k miles on it , it stickered in 06 for $48k
We paid $3000, which was $500 more than the Buick dealer was offering them in trade .

91-97 Thunderbirds and Cougars are the best car for the money you can find .

They are rear wheel drive so easy to work on , most are V8 so they have adequate power , and they share parts with mustangs and other Ford’s so the parts are cheap and easy to find .

you can get a nice , one family owned always garaged one with under 130ish k miles for $2000-2500 easy .

Anything newer is far too complicated for the average shade tree mechanic to work on .
My cousin drives a lot , for his job and is in alot of blue collar and urban neighborhoods, and doesn’t wasn’t anything flashy.
He gets a nice thunderbird or cougar for somewhere between $900 and $1800 and replaces the ball joints , radiator and fan, shocks and brakes and tires and drives the wheels off of it .
When the engine or transmission , blows he finds another one , and moves the replaced parts to the new one and keeps rolling .
He’s on the fourth one , in about 15 years.

he might have spent $10k total on them in the last 15 years but I doubt it /


ain’t no way I’m ever gonnna pay $29k for a used car
I’m in my mid 50s . And I have never bought a brand new car , and never will .

I can’t stand dealing with the sales weasels at the stealership , and they depreciate way way too fast .

you gotta find a mechanic who does side work nights and weekends at their house,


There’s a lot of people who just don’t want to deal with the Craigslist idiots and strangers coming to their house etc
And those people will sell their car super cheap to not have to deal with that .

And traditionally stealerships offer next to nothing for a trade in ,if you know someone who is looking for a new car and trading in their car on a new one , have them tell the sales weasel when they ask about trade in , that you’re gonna give the car to your daughter, nephew etc

then when the final price is done , ask about trade in , and tell the owner to give you a quick call that you will likley be happy to pay that for the car .

ibe gotten several cars for dirt cheap that way .
But you gotta teal the sales weasel that you’re not trading , or they will Jack the price of the new car so they can falsely give you more for
Your trade in .
Most people don’t care about the price of the new car , all they care about is the trade in value and the monthly payment.
mans they care about the gas milage , but don’t care about the depreciation, which costs a lot lot lot more than a lifetime supply of gasoline .

I buy large comfortable vehicles at the bottom of their depreciation cycle , about 8-10 years old, sometimes at an auction , sometimes from a private seller , and I don’t care about the mpg at all if I get a good vehicle for a great price .

.

 

I figured this is what you drove to work

 

To be sure there are cars for less.. but a 5k car is now almost certainly a junk heap or salvage car that was in a flood or something. I just bought a nice little tiny car for 8k.. with 24k on the clock. There were times when you could buy and iffy car and work on some things and get them back to something more dependable. But tools, knowledge and desire are all but gone from the planet for most people. So the market is what it is for the "average" people. Actually about 15 years ago, the condition and prices of used cars drove me back to buying new cars again. Something I swore off thirty years ago

https://www.google.com/search?q=ave...3j0i390l3.10299j0j15&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

 

Wish I could sell all the old cars in my yard for $5k each


This is about what I was talking about
2 owners . All Maint records . Asking $2000
Little high on the price but you gotta factor in Brandon’s 35% inflation


1994 Mercury Cougar - cars & trucks - by owner - vehicle automotive...

 

Go to FB marketplace and see some of the outright junk some people are trying to get dragged out of their swampy property