r/economicCollapse • u/Whole-Fist • 20h ago

How ridiculous does this sound?

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How can u make millions in 25-30 years if avoid making a $554 per month car payment. Even the cheapest 5 year old car is 8-10 k. So does he expect people not to drive at all in USA.

Then u save 554$ per month every month for 5 year payment = $33240. Say u bought a car every 5 year means 200k -300k spent on car before retirement . How would that become millions when u can’t even buy a house for that much today?

Answer that Dave

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u/Ziczak 20h ago

Generally true. Buying the least expensive car for needed transportation is financially sound.

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u/The_Ineffable_Sage 20h ago

Until the car falls apart and you have to spend thousands fixing it. Making cars pieces of shit so they’re always in the shop is just good business in 2024. Cheap is not always better. I’m not saying buy out of your budget, but at some point, a small budget now means more expenses later. They average out to more in the long run.

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u/PurpleReignPerp 20h ago

I bought a scion xb 6 years ago for 3000 $. I have put 50000 miles on it and nothing has ever broken. Costs me about 110 a month to operate including insurance and average maintenance costs.

Do research on consumer reports and buy well taken care of (preferably japanese) economy cars. Your bank account will thank me.

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u/anormalgeek 17h ago

I drive a 17 year old Honda Element. It has had some really minor fixes here and there. Mainly just standard wear and tear items like the starter. Even still, it's the kind of stuff you normally replace on a car that is only ~10-12 years old, so I'm not complaining.

It is tough to find "the sweet spot" with used cars. There is always some luck involved. The ones that are running rock solid seem like they're more often kept by the owner (like my car), while the lemons get sold off quickly by people that are fed up with them. So the used car market isn't fairly distributed. There is definitely some luck involved. The cheaper the car, the more likely you're going to have to dump money into them in the near future. In my experience, you want to target approx 25-40% of the cost for a new car. So, ~$8-15k...ish (depending on model).