My pop has a van with around 150,000 miles on it, many of which are highway miles from vacations. He stays on top of the maintenance and has it serviced regularly. He recently had it in for some service, and the mechanic said the front end needed some fairly pricey repairs but not astronomical money...around 600 bucks. He told my dad that considering the mileage, he should think about just getting a new vehicle.

My dad looked at him and said, "I'm 82 years old. Do you really think I'm going to go buy a new car and make car payments for another 5 or 6 years?"

His van is getting repaired.

My car is pushing 150,000 miles too. I'd much rather repair it occasionally than make monthly payments, and I hope it lasts until I'm 82. That's my opinion...and I come by it honest.

God bless Pop. He's been a wonderful role model for my 50 years of existence on this planet. I've learned that he ain't cheap. He's just a pragmatist.

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Just pretend this is witty.

Your pop is just a little older than I am. We're children of the Great Depression and World War II, when pragmatism was essential to getting by.

He learned well, and I salute him.

Sounds as if you learned well too.

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Oh well, what the hell.

I'm much younger than Pop. My son is a professional auto mechanic. I do 50K mile service on my wife's car and my truck. Change coolant, trans fluid, filter at 50K and 100 K miles. I also changed all the front struts, rear shocks, serpentine belt and coolant hoses at 100K miles "even though it wasn't necessary" until the old ones were off, and we found soft spots in the hoses.

I had one hose failure on the highway, and one hose failure in the driveway. An extra 7K miles on a hose isn't going to make any difference. Preventative maintenance is much cheaper than catastrophic repair on a highway vehicle. I don't want another frantic, angry, and scared phone call from a wife that has a broke car.

Antifreeze, filters, and transmission fluid is cheaper than replacing an engine or transmission. At age 70, I'm thinking "lifetime" repairs; do it once and never again.

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S&WHF 366

Well there is also another way to look at it........

If Pop is in good shape and he can afford a new car, why not drive in style? just saying.........

Remember, 82 is the old 72

Good for pop! I like his style.

My guess was it's a Ford and it needed ball joints.

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God spelled backwards is dog.

I'm 64 but I'm with your 82 year old Dad. I have two vehicles with combined mileage of 400,000 and have no plans to retire either one. I would rather spend my extra money on old S&W pistols than a new car. As soon as the warrantee expires, I do all my own maintenance and repairs. I only carry liability insurance on them. If you sit down and do the math on continuing to drive a vehicle vs. buying a new one it's usually a no-Brainer.

Yup, frugality is great unless you got a car full of children in danger. Had a tired old car die in a very dangerous intersection, with my whole young family aboard. That was the last time I owned a tired old car. And yes, once we got rescued, the phone call to my husband made clear there was a new paradigm in effect.

My Ranger has about 170k on it. About 40k of that is mine. I bought it for $1500 a few years ago, and I have since spent more than that on repairs. Most recently it was $800 for ball joints and shocks.

I consider it money well spent, as insurance is cheap and I have no car payments.

As for stalling in an intersection with a full load of children, I drive a school bus that can do that. There are days when I go to great lengths to avoid rail crossings.

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Not in jail.

I have two high mileage rides....one has 412k and the other 327k. One was paid off in 2001, the other in 2008, and the $$$ that I saved not making payments is more than enough to cover basic repairs and maint.

As long as I have a choice, I will not drive questionable vehicles, so I know that there will be another truck payment sometime in my future

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On the Oak Savannah

At least for me & being well over sixty-five, I find at extremely humerus when making a purchase and some half brain dead 20 yr old wants to impress on me that the item has a "life time" warranty. Not that I would ever make any smart@$$ reply. hardcase60

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You want me to do what?

Paul, your dad sounds like a wise, caring man who loves his son and his son loves him. Win.

My dad was a pragmatist.

Mom was Anglican.

They worked it out.

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Music/Sports/Beer fan

My friend's Grandpa was car shopping about 15 years ago. The salesman tried to upsell him on the remote with door/trunk locks. Shows him that with a push of a button the trunk springs open. My friend's Grandpa looks at it and asks.....

"Do the groceries or luggage get there all by themselves?" "No", replied the salesman! "Well....if I have to carry my own bags and lift them and place them in the trunk I think I can manage to turn a key!"

Sent from my XT1650 using Tapatalk

My dad told me over fifty years ago that the best cure for new car fever is to go look at the prices on the new ones. That still rings true today for me.

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Old Age Ain't For Sissies

My Parents had a couple of cars until Dad bought Mom her first new car and around the same time a truck for him. Both 1966 models, Country Squire and F-100.

Mom never liked the wagon much and he traded it in the eighties for a new Capri. That car sucked and they a her a Cougar in the early nineties.

I got the Wagon and got wrecked pretty bad in it and I sold the Capri to a friend who later wrecked it.

Dad drove the F-100 until he couldn't anymore in about 2012.

I sold it and wish now I hadn't. I have lots of memories of that truck. It was red in'66. I painted it Black Cherry in about '90 Dad did lots of upgrades to it pretty much using Ford parts. He "borrowed" two Top Loader 4-Speeds from me.

Check the date on the pic. A sad day for me. It was always supposed to be mine when he parted.

Attached Images

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Dum vivo cano