Would this be a good first car?

[GruntOfAction]

Riding my bike on the highway scares me. "That idiot doesn't even see me!"
I drive a Honda Civic (05), but it isn't mine. It's the family car so to speak. I have plenty saved up, and am planning on getting an old CJ-5, CJ-7, or a Five quarter ton. With those vehicles, you know that you'll probably never get stuck in the snow or stuck in general!

Lol...Well when your like me and live in Senic nowhere off of Non-exciting drive you don't find very many good cars...

EDIT:I just remembered I have 3 cash goldmines which might help me get money for a car...

1. 5 Complete Boxed sets of Hess vehicles.

2. Jeff Gordon Alarm clock w/ Dale Earherdt voiceset (should go for alot in Hillbilly Hell AKA where I live.)

3. Burnt out Lava Lamp Lightbulb w/ Atari Symbol burnt into it...

 

[AoBfrost]

Lol...Well when your like me and live in Senic nowhere off of Non-exciting drive you don't find very many good cars...

EDIT:I just remembered I have 3 cash goldmines which might help me get money for a car...

1. 5 Complete Boxed sets of Hess vehicles.

2. Jeff Gordon Alarm clock w/ Dale Earherdt voiceset (should go for alot in Hillbilly Hell AKA where I live.)

3. Burnt out Lava Lamp Lightbulb w/ Atari Symbol burnt into it...

I wont be having a car anytime soon for myself, but I'm saving for a scooter, 125cc, I rode one recently and now I am addicted to it, seeing a 125cc bike get to 70mph was amazing. Then gotta get a preformance muffler to give it a extra 5-10 mph.

 

[GruntOfAction]

I just found a 94 Jeep Cheroke with 2 RWD...Unlisted mileage but its going for 1,995..

 

[AoBfrost]

Grunt, buying the cheapest car on the net isnt the smartest idea, you will be paying thousands in repair. I'd geta car in the 10000 dollar range, it's newer, and running alot better.

 

[Razgriz]

Keep saving until you have enough money for a good car. If you aboslutely NEED a car right now, then you could always get a loan and pay it back. Of course, you better be on time with your payments though!

 

[AoBfrost]

1. Why do you need a car right now?
2. Why are you choosing a car more than 10 years old as a first
3. Cars that old wont be running like new unless taken care of
4. I have a job and work my butt off every day to make money
5. Prize rebel got me 2 things and you make it sound like a big deal
6. Without a job, 10k is hard to get, but without a job, 2k and repair bills is impossible to pay.

Buying a car for 2k that needs thousands of repair bills isnt fun. I'm not saying to just get 10k, 10k is very cheap for a car whether used or new, if you cant get 10k to buy a car, then I dont think buying a car is even a good idea right now.

You need to remember.

Your saving for just the money to buy the car, you need to remember there is oil changes, buying new tires, getting other minor work/repairs done occasionally, and buying gas.

A jeep is not your best friend on gas bills, and gas being 2.80-3.09 a gallon, you'll need to save for thousands more if you want to the car to work while you own it.

Keep saving until you have enough money for a good car. If you aboslutely NEED a car right now, then you could always get a loan and pay it back. Of course, you better be on time with your payments though!

I wouldnt use loans, it's better for your credit score if you just pay full price upfront with cash/credit card, if you're late to pay a loan, your credit score can go down, then in the future when you want a loan for another house or car, you cant get one because you killed your credit score in the past. This happened to my friend when he bought his first car, he thought he could pay 300 dollars a month for a loan, he couldnt, so he was short of cash every month, then when he finally paid it off, he wanted to get a house, couldnt.

 

[GruntOfAction]

1. Why do you need a car right now?
2. Why are you choosing a car more than 10 years old as a first
3. Cars that old wont be running like new unless taken care of
4. I have a job and work my butt off every day to make money
5. Prize rebel got me 2 things and you make it sound like a big deal
6. Without a job, 10k is hard to get, but without a job, 2k and repair bills is impossible to pay.

Buying a car for 2k that needs thousands of repair bills isnt fun. I'm not saying to just get 10k, 10k is very cheap for a car whether used or new, if you cant get 10k to buy a car, then I dont think buying a car is even a good idea right now.

You need to remember.

Your saving for just the money to buy the car, you need to remember there is oil changes, buying new tires, getting other minor work/repairs done occasionally, and buying gas.

A jeep is not your best friend on gas bills, and gas being 2.80-3.09 a gallon, you'll need to save for thousands more if you want to the car to work while you own it.
I wouldnt use loans, it's better for your credit score if you just pay full price upfront with cash/credit card, if you're late to pay a loan, your credit score can go down, then in the future when you want a loan for another house or car, you cant get one because you killed your credit score in the past. This happened to my friend when he bought his first car, he thought he could pay 300 dollars a month for a loan, he couldnt, so he was short of cash every month, then when he finally paid it off, he wanted to get a house, couldnt.

1. Driving to a Job would be perfered
2. BECAUSE IM NOT RICH LIKE YOU ARE APPARENTLY
3. Gee, you think? And here I was just going to joyride in the damned thing [/sarcasim]
4. I'd love to have a job but I have to turn 17 in one month first, and actually driving there in a car is perfered.
skipping 5.
6. The 2k is saved up money already, and since my brother in law is a mechanic and has SHOWN me how to do oil changes and other stuff I won't need some monkey to do it every time it breaks unlike you apparently do.

 

[Vexona]

1. Driving to a Job would be perfered
2. BECAUSE IM NOT RICH LIKE YOU ARE APPARENTLY
3. Gee, you think? And here I was just going to joyride in the damned thing [/sarcasim]
4. I'd love to have a job but I have to turn 17 in one month first, and actually driving there in a car is perfered.
skipping 5.
6. The 2k is saved up money already, and since my brother in law is a mechanic and has SHOWN me how to do oil changes and other stuff I won't need some monkey to do it every time it breaks unlike you apparently do.

You know, Frost took a long time to thoroughly reply to your questions and he wasn't being condescending or anything. I think he was trying to share his experience since he is in a similar situation. There's no need to get an attitude just because you don't agree with someone's advice =/.

Also, no matter what your knowledge of cars is, even the most basic of parts and fluids can be ridiculously expensive. You can only put in so much sweat equity into a vehicle.

 

[AoBfrost]

Just leave it alone, when you get a car, you'll find out how much expense that is hidden you need to put into it, you cant fix everything yourself. Plus oil changes you will need a lift, cars today are too low to get under, unless you get the jeep.

Plus, I was in no way flaming or arguing with him, All I was doing was giving some cold hard facts, if he cant handle them, he cant handle owning a car.

 

[GruntOfAction]

Just leave it alone, when you get a car, you'll find out how much expense that is hidden you need to put into it, you cant fix everything yourself. Plus oil changes you will need a lift, cars today are too low to get under, unless you get the jeep.

Plus, I was in no way flaming or arguing with him, All I was doing was giving some cold hard facts, if he cant handle them, he cant handle owning a car.

I can handle owning a car dude. I know what responsibilities are within it.

I could always take your advice, get a 10k car, and end up homeless.

 

[volkov]

A lot of times you can tell by looking at a car more or less what kind of care has been put into it. Some dealers are tricky, so I'd take a look at a few cars in the dealership to find out exactly how much work they put into the average car to make it look "well taken care of" and then base judgements off of that. A lot of second hand dealers really don't put much effort in once they've covered a few of the obvious parts, you just need to figure out what the dealer considers "ready to sell" and make sure your car is a few notches higher if your looking for one that was well mantained by the original owner before it hit the car lot. My firebird was second hand, but we knew it was a gem immediately. Every corner of the car was clean, no dirt in even the hard to reach places around the door hinges, the engine looked like it had never seen dirt. Basically it was amazing well kept comparitive to other second hand cars. It turns out it was a great deal and I've never been happier.

Granted this doesn't work 100% of the time, but I'm normally the guy my family goes to about buying cars and so far I've picked some good ones.

Another good thing is pro car inspecters, yeah they can cost a little but can save you a lot. We had one look over my car and his analysis was EXTREMELY detailed, he mentioned every little detail, mainly to say they were ok, because, like I said, my car had been very well taken care of. And jeeps are a very good car to go with. My brother has a wrangler, my friend has a grand cherokee, both are over 100,000, the grand cherokee being actualy over 200,000 (only barely tho) with no problems yet except a tail light that died and the read out thing in the car on the dash wouldn't stop saying a door was open, but apart from that no major work apart from routine mantainence has been done on it. The wrangler has had it's share of mudding, and has had to go through the terrible experience of my brother learning to drive a manual (which destroyed the clutch), but it's still going strong. Both of these jeeps use the older strait 6 engine, which in my opinion is as near bulletproof as engines get.

And frost is definately right about the costs after buying the car. If you are lucky enough to avoid repair work, you still have to worry about mantainence, gas, and insurance costs and they can still be a killer.

 

[Vexona]

I could always take your advice, get a 10k car, and end up homeless.

Nah you'll have a great car to live in!!

I kid, I kid.


Seriously, the worst part is the insurance. If you're a male and under 25 you are sooo screwed >< That crap is more expensive than the darn car.

 

[volkov]

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Vexona @ Feb 8 2008, 07:54 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>Seriously, the worst part is the insurance. If you're a male and under 25 you are sooo screwed >< That crap is more expensive than the darn car.</div>

Amen, and I've had the bad fortune to be involved in a few crashes and have two of them blamed on me. The first I was pulling out of my parking space, someone comes flyng around the corner on the wrong side of the road, nails me, calls the cops, calls her family to come watch, and then gets me a ticket for damage she had on the car likely before she hit me, despite the 3 witnessess I had (my car was virtually unscathed). The other one was kind of my fault, the woman in front of me plowed into a stopped car at 50 MPH. Being in a lower car I hadn't seen the stopped car, only saw that she hit something, hard. So I hit the brakes, but brakes don't stop you as fast as another car will, and I didn't leave enough breaking room.. yeah that sucked. Then I've been hit by a drunk driver (that was the end of my first firebird) and a woman who hit me when I was stopped at a red light.. go figure. You don't want to know what my insurance is now.

Oh and then I've been pulled for speeding three times, one was fair (I like to go fast, and he caught me), one was ridiculous and the guy wouldn't let me argue, and it was some backwoods court where I couldn't fight without a full jury (yeah wtf?), and the final one I told the officer he was wrong and asked to see his radar gun, so he threatened me by telling me he'd show me his real gun, and then told me if I asked anymore questions I'd spend the night in jail.

 

[GruntOfAction]

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Vexona @ Feb 8 2008, 02:54 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>Nah you'll have a great car to live in!!

I kid, I kid.
Seriously, the worst part is the insurance. If you're a male and under 25 you are sooo screwed >< That crap is more expensive than the darn car.</div>

If thats the case then im resorting to my mom's idea...

"Mother taxi"...lol..

 

[smilie120]

Listen, if your looking for a 1st car Dont go bying a 4x4 or a jeep, you have to think about insurance and maintenaces too, the insurance will probrably be the same prices as the car itself. I sudgest you get a job first, save some money, run around and get a few quotes on some cars, then decide what is best for you.

 

[AoBfrost]

Buying a 10k car will not make you homeless, if you're still young, you'll still be living with your parents, and if you have a job, you'll be making money. Seriously, if you just save money, it starts to grow quickly. You wont make 10k in just a few months, but if you save all your money and be patient, you will have it done, plus, your parents could always lend you 2-3k.

 

[GruntOfAction]

your parents could always lend you 2-3k.

This made me laugh the most...

My parents wouldn't be able to lend me 2-3k..They'd need a loan from someone else to lend me it..lol..

I could always buy a Dodge Astro Van..There's one with a microwave and a fridge in our newspaper...Looks like I'd have a car, and a house..for 995..LOL!

 

[abandonship]

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Vexona @ Feb 8 2008, 01:54 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>Nah you'll have a great car to live in!!

I kid, I kid.
Seriously, the worst part is the insurance. If you're a male and under 25 you are sooo screwed >< That crap is more expensive than the darn car.</div>
yeah my dad wont let me buy this fixer-upper corvette because as soon as i get it running if i wanted to drive it our insurance would fly through the roof. darn...

 

[smilie120]

This made me laugh the most...

My parents wouldn't be able to lend me 2-3k..They'd need a loan from someone else to lend me it..lol..

I could always buy a Dodge Astro Van..There's one with a microwave and a fridge in our newspaper...Looks like I'd have a car, and a house..for 995..LOL!

Im telling you now GruntOfAction you dont want to buy a van for you 1st car.......Unreliable,high insurance,dont do very well on mpg, Driving lessons, driving test,maintenace ect. Buy a bike if you dont have the money, or cant you ride 1? And turst me you get a lot more Cred if ur driving a bike than a van.

 

[redragon74]

Honestly dude if im turning 17 in a month and i'm gonna have a job the LAST thing I AM going TO DO is RIDE A BIKE ON THE INTERSTATE TO A JOB...Okay???? I'd perfer a vehicle with a roof on it and 4 wheels that drives.

i ride a zoot scoot to work everyday on highways its actually kinda fun lol object of it is, is keep an eye on your mirrors almost at all times