I Don’t Want to Buy a Van
Posted by Chris
Let me just start by saying - I hate car troubles! To make matters worse - I don't trust mechanics. Those two things make things really difficult when something happens to one of our vehicles.
I'd have to say that we have been blessed with having fairly minimal problems with any of our cars - all the way back with our first car purchase together - a new 1994 Mazda Protege (man, that was a great car). That is, until the past year or so. I think we have spent more on car repairs in the last 12 months than in the past nearly 12 years of being married.
Which brings me to today... Our van's steering is acting screwy. Normally I'd take it in to a local mechanic that has done decent work on our cars before. But, we're at the point where we have something that is a non-critical repair that would cost more than we want to invest in the van anyhow. I can't bring myself to take the van in & pay someone to tell me how much it's going to cost to fix something I don't want to fix, spending money I no longer want to sink into the van.
The irony (or Divine providence, depending on how you look at it) is that as of this week our van is paid for. I wanted this to be something we could celebrate, take that extra payment we wouldn't have & put it towards debt (or put it away to start saving toward a replacement vehicle in another couple of years).
Then the AC went out. Actually the AC went out last fall & we decided to wait & get it fixed before it started getting warmer again in the spring. We took it in a few weeks back only to find out the problem was (in the words of our mechanic) "catastrophic failure." You never want to hear the word 'catastrophic' used in relationship to anything let alone a van you're fixing to have paid off.
So we determined to try & sweat through the summer, put back our 'would be' payments & buy a replacement next spring. Then we had something else go wrong that we just couldn't bring ourselves to pay money to fix - and we probably couldn't make it past the summer with it. So, we'll just save up for a month & go buy a van in May. Then today happened.
I don't want to buy a van. Our family is too big & too young not to have a larger vehicle, though, and we just can't risk losing value in our current van by taking a risk that something else is going to happen that would drop the resale value considerably.
Wow - didn't mean to vent that much - just not the way you want to start the week, I guess.
God's good - even when life sucks (that would make a good bumper sticker). This could have all happened a year ago, when we still owed a lot on the van & would have probably owed more than it was worth. But it didn't. In fact, it is happened the exact week that we pay off our van.
So, we'll probably be shopping for a replacement this weekend (provided we can get the van title mailed to us in time from Kansas after it is officially paid off in the next couple of days.
I'd have to say that we have been blessed with having fairly minimal problems with any of our cars - all the way back with our first car purchase together - a new 1994 Mazda Protege (man, that was a great car). That is, until the past year or so. I think we have spent more on car repairs in the last 12 months than in the past nearly 12 years of being married.
Which brings me to today... Our van's steering is acting screwy. Normally I'd take it in to a local mechanic that has done decent work on our cars before. But, we're at the point where we have something that is a non-critical repair that would cost more than we want to invest in the van anyhow. I can't bring myself to take the van in & pay someone to tell me how much it's going to cost to fix something I don't want to fix, spending money I no longer want to sink into the van.
The irony (or Divine providence, depending on how you look at it) is that as of this week our van is paid for. I wanted this to be something we could celebrate, take that extra payment we wouldn't have & put it towards debt (or put it away to start saving toward a replacement vehicle in another couple of years).
Then the AC went out. Actually the AC went out last fall & we decided to wait & get it fixed before it started getting warmer again in the spring. We took it in a few weeks back only to find out the problem was (in the words of our mechanic) "catastrophic failure." You never want to hear the word 'catastrophic' used in relationship to anything let alone a van you're fixing to have paid off.
So we determined to try & sweat through the summer, put back our 'would be' payments & buy a replacement next spring. Then we had something else go wrong that we just couldn't bring ourselves to pay money to fix - and we probably couldn't make it past the summer with it. So, we'll just save up for a month & go buy a van in May. Then today happened.
I don't want to buy a van. Our family is too big & too young not to have a larger vehicle, though, and we just can't risk losing value in our current van by taking a risk that something else is going to happen that would drop the resale value considerably.
Wow - didn't mean to vent that much - just not the way you want to start the week, I guess.
God's good - even when life sucks (that would make a good bumper sticker). This could have all happened a year ago, when we still owed a lot on the van & would have probably owed more than it was worth. But it didn't. In fact, it is happened the exact week that we pay off our van.
So, we'll probably be shopping for a replacement this weekend (provided we can get the van title mailed to us in time from Kansas after it is officially paid off in the next couple of days.
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