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      01-17-2013, 08:58 AM   #7
baege
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Drives: 2022 Cayman GTS 4.0 6MT
Join Date: Jun 2009
Location: Toronto, Canada

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Quote:
Originally Posted by elwesso View Post
One thing that's always kept me hanging onto my cars is when you consider the cost of repairs versus what you'd pay for a newer car.

Example- My parents bought a Buick Lacrosse in 2010 (but 2011 MY), put probably about 35k on it in a almost 2 years.. They then bought a 2012 model of the exact same car, except it was a different color and a brand new vehicle. Effectively, my parents paid probably 10k for the exact same car, and really all they gained was a warranty. I thought this was stupid, but hey it's not my money.. In their case, the chances of them having any major repairs before 60-100k (like a transmission) is pretty unlikely.. Maybe tires and brakes somewhere between 35k and 60k.

Lets say you get 30k USD for your Z4 (probably high, but humor me)... You're going to pay at least 64k for a Cayman S (why bother with the base model), so thats a difference of 34k. For $34,000, you could EASILY replace your entire drivetrain with brand new..

My point is, it's almost always cheaper to keep a good running vehicle than to buy a new one purely from the standpoint of worrying about repairs. It's pretty unlikely you'll have any major meltdowns at 35k.. If your car is the manual transmission, you probably have until 100k miles until you're thinking about clutch. Outside of that, it's just normal maintenance or the oddball problem that comes up. These cars don't have a lot of major mechanical issues, so I wouldn't worry about it.

I know sometimes a $1000 repair bill can hurt, but would you rather have one of those once a year (worst case scenario) or a be paying nearly that per month in a payment?

BTW, if you're going to Porsche and expecting better reliability that's definitely amusing. Not saying they're bad cars, but I'd trust a BMW to stay out of the shop more than a porsche, and also to be CONSIDERABLY cheaper to maintain.

Thanks for the post. I've had similar thoughts. I buy my cars outright so payments aren't a consideration. But obviously a newer car depreciates at a much higher rate. My Z will likely only lose maybe 8-10K of its value in the next 3 years. A 2014 cayman is going to depreciate about 25-30K in the same time frame (if you factor in what it costs you to get it on the road including taxes). So the difference is 17 to 20K. It would take a lot of repairs to make up that difference.

Last edited by baege; 01-17-2013 at 09:21 AM..
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