JoeS4

lot of stuff myself, but various things just keep happening. I cover over 500 miles/wk for work now, and it's not practical for me to have more than 1 car. My car only has 60,000 miles, but now it needs another ignition coil and a wheel bearing, not to mention various maintenance items that are coming up. I love my S more than anything, but it's coming to a point where the repairs and maintenance are seriously affecting my ability to save money, and having it off the road semi-often is a huge inconvenience. Plus I'd rather lose it than not take care of it properly, and it seems I can't afford to anymore. I might go to the Mazda dealership in the next few days and get a Mazdaspeed3. It literally pains me just to say this.

HIS4

I went through this same thinking recently but figuring on how much you'd spend on a new car payment (maybe $400/mo) I could easily justify keeping the car because having no car payment is excellent.

JoeS4

that in the past. No payment is nice, but when you're spending several thousand $ per year in repairs alone...I dunno. Who knows? Maybe I'll go test drive some things and say hell no. For now, I just don't think I can swing the S4 anymore. We'll see...

PartyBoyRacing

It's hard to make good financial decisions when emotions are involved...that's probably why I've never made a good financial decision and still own an S4 ;-)

Here's how it works for me after every repair job: "Whew, since I've basically replaced most everything at least once, I figure it's really like a new car now and shouldn't break anymo.....ah crap, now what!!"

~ You'll always loose your money chasing after an Audi, but you'll never loose your Audi chasing after money. ~

iznogoud

I calculated this sometime ago. I figured that if
you are going to sell a car that is consting you
to maintain, but add any sort of payment or have to
pay anything to go to a different car, you are better
off keeping it and geting a junker. If you get a junker
that you can totally neglect in terms of maintenance,
your insuranse for two cars and a small one-time
payment for a junker will be overall cheaper. It
gives you an dvantage when it comes to doing repairs
on one car in that you have another one to drive.
The most important thing, I believe, is that you
drive something that you like at the end.

Of course, if it really is costing you that much
to have something that you like, you just do not
have it and live with hte bitterness. But going
to any payment for a different money-pit (like
any car really is) is a bad idea. You will suffer
the mental pain for parting with something that
you had a liked, and the original problem is not
really going away.

A junker is great. If you get a junker for say
$2-3k and drive it around, you can get another
junker in a year or so after you sold this
junker for a little bit of money... Makes much
more sense to me, but never take my advise alone.

HIS4

For me, I was thinking I would be replacing the S with either a B7RS4, B7S4, A64.2, or maybe a 535i which would be a monthly payment of anywhere from $600 to $800 depending on the down payment. Now that's about $7k-$10k per year so as long as my repair bill didn't get anywhere close to that, it was cheaper for me to keep the car. Now when you adjust those numbers to a Mazdaspeed 3, it may become a little more interesting.

JoeS4

That it does. The payments literally might be less than what I spend to keep the S4 running right.

Jsmooth65

So I think you should stay with the S4.

nyet

i totally hear you. All those "little things" definitely add up.

JoeS4

tying that side of my brain up and shoving it in the closet with a sock in its mouth. If I had more disposable income, I'd keep the S forever and just spend plenty of money with Carson @ Riverside, ECS, etc. If I didn't need a fairly nice/reliable car to drive daily b/c of my job, I'd just get a total beater and be a 2 car guy.

It's a really hard thing for me to accept, but I think I just might have to.