Coffee heat rising

Want Car. Want Car!!

Trying to get a grip here. But lookit this:

All together now: oooooohhhhhhh!  ahhhhhhhhhh!

Isn’t that a sweet little car? A Honda Fit (turn off the sound before clicking on that link!). And isn’t 28 mpg ever so much sweeter than the 18 mpg the Dog Chariot makes when it’s in a good mood?

Want car.

At $15,0000 or $16,000, the price is pretty good. I could keep the Dog Chariot (or give it to my son, except he thinks it’s “gay”) and pay in cash from my car savings. But if the D.C. is really worth around five grand, as Kelly Blue Book says it is, then what I’d have to pay in cash would not deplete my car savings. Not by a long shot. If I paid myself back a couple hundred a month, or even just $100 a month, over the vehicle’s proposed ten-year lifetime, that would recharge the car savings and then some.

The fly in the ointment is the outrageous cost of car registration in Arizona. They really gouge you for new cars. The tax drops each year—the older your car is, the less you pay for registration—until by the time the junker gets to be as antiquated as the Dog Chariot, registration costs so little even someone like me can pay it out of pocket, without having to borrow or self-escrow for a year.

This flies in the face of reason. Why does Arizona have to do everything bass-ackwards? It would make sense to charge drivers more for each year the car ages. This would tend to get gas-guzzling, unsafe vehicles off the road, and it would gently stimulate sales of newer models. The truth is, the high annual cost of automobile registration is a significant motivator, for me at least, to keep the old junk running.

And of course, insurance would go up, too. Right now my car insurance is almost more than I can afford to pay. I’d have to drop the million-dollar umbrella, which (between you and me and the rest of the galaxy) insures this site against libel suits. Since companies have taken to suing bloggers for saying unkind things about their products and services (is there one among us who has not complained about the likes of Comcast, Qwest, or Chico’s?), it behooves one to have such a policy. Even without the extra coverage, insurance premiums on a new car would end up being around the same as I’m paying now, I expect.

So the savings on gasoline would be mooted, many times over.

But oh! Wouldn’t it be loverly to have such a pretty little, maneuverable little, gas-efficient little car?

9 thoughts on “Want Car. Want Car!!”

  1. I share your car envy, but I don’t think 28 mpg is really all that good. My Civic gets 29/35, and it’s 11 years old now. You’d think they would have worked harder to improve fuel efficiency during the past 10 years.

    My eye is on the Ford Fiesta, which gets 40 mpg and, depending on the model and extras you get, costs $13,000 to $17,000.

  2. Forty mpg… ahhhhh!

    Still…it’s a Ford. I had such a bad experience with a Ford, I will never own another one, no matter how wonderful Consumer Reports says it is.

  3. Hmm, really…..except for my first car, a ford maverick which my auto mechanic grandfather picked out for me, i’ve always driven Japanese cars.

    I might add that the new ford fiesta has a 3-year bumper to bumper warranty (36K).

    For ages now, i had my heart set on a prius, but i’ve come to the conclusion that the miles per gallon don’t justify the extra high price tag of a hybrid. The fit is cute as you said, but i want more mileage. I like the great mileage of the VW jetta TDI diesel, but again with a foreign-made vehicle, you’r e paying top dollar.

  4. @ fern: Yes, I feel the same wariness about the hybrid. LOVE the Prius, covet it. But the truth is, some of the gas-powered cars are getting acceptable mileage–if the Fiesta really gets 40 mpg, that shows a gasoline engine CAN do it.

    LOL! My Ford had a warranty on it, too. All that meant was that it spent most of its time in the repair shop for free, or nearly free. Until the warranty ran out. By then the paint was wearing off and it was falling apart.

  5. We are not madly in love with our Civic Hybrid (2002), bought before the premium on hybrids. We remain madly in love with our 1998 Camry. Mr. FS thinks our next car may be a Hyundai, which has a 10 year warranty.

    The Fit is a nice car–we rented one once.

    But Funny…W-A-I-T. You know that, right?

  6. @ frugalscholar: I loved my Camry. Alas, that model is now outside my price range. Plus I remain nervous about Toyota, which I fear is sliding down the same path Ford took.

  7. This past spring I, too, fell totally in love with the Fit. Cute, sporty, affordable, nicely equipped, gadgety, good gas mileage.

    Everything was great until I test drove it. Lots of body lean. Really, really, really long stopping distance for a car so small. Totally lacking in power – getting on the highway was a chore, the engine screamed for another gear that didn’t exist (I drove the manual), and I had to slow down to merge (there was no chance of overtaking a car in the next lane).

    I passed.

    • @ Susan: That was smart.

      One of the reasons I love my Sienna is that its gas-guzzling six-banger can easily outrun a moron who tries to pass me on the right on the freeway onramp. Boy, are those chuckleheads surprised!

      I understand, however, that the Camry’s four-banger, which is a bit more fuel-efficient, also has plenty of pick-up speed.

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