Fix it or replace it? My husband's POS.

[jcox2]

My husband has a Saturn Ion that we are very upside down on. We bought it back when we had terrible credit and are paying a ridiculous amount of interest on it. Now the car needs a new engine that will run us several thousand dollars to replace and we still owe about $4000 on it. We are in an usual situation where we will be able to pay off his car and will have about $4k left over to replace it with something else. I know it seems like we should just fix it, but the car is small for my 4 person family and who knows what else could go wrong with it. We are worried if we fix it that it will end up needing another huge repair that we won't be able to manage in the future. Running it until it dies and then just replacing it is attractive. We intend to pay it off either way, but do we use the rest to fix it or towards something else that may be in better general condition? Thanks-

[brotatochip]

If it were me I'd cut my losses and sell the Saturn as is and try to recoup some of the money.  A used Camry with 50,000 miles can be had for $5000 - $7000.  Just my 2¢.  Good luck and let us know what you decide.

[patrickza]

Do some reading on the sunk cost fallacy.

My view: If it's expensive and unreliable, it has to go.