Author Topic: HELP! (I bought a Clown Car...)  (Read 8098 times)

GagaHonk

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HELP! (I bought a Clown Car...)
« on: May 15, 2013, 01:37:24 PM »
So, last December I made a terrible decision. I bought a brand new 2013 Ford Taurus SHO sedan.  Some other facts.
- I paid for it with cash.
- I use it to drive back and forth to work (40 miles round trip).
- I am almost always its only passenger.
- It gets less than 20 mpg.
- Its insurance (liability + comp and collision) costs $101 /month.
So I think the only correct thing to do is to sell it and, since I am not yet in a position to bike to work (sorry), buy a used hatchback so I can get at least double that gas mileage.  And do all that as quickly and efficiently as possible.
Is that correct?
Also, I paid a total of something like $42,000 for the Taurus.  If I sell it for, say, $36,000 next month, can anyone help me feel better about the math for how long it takes me to make up the $6,000 of lost money wasted on buying the Clown Car for a higher price than I am selling it for six/seven months later?
I'm happy to be planning to put, say, $25,000 back into our liquid net worth (I'm thinking I'll spend ~$10,000 for my smarter car choice), but I'm also wanting to feel good that selling the Taurus tomorrow instead of two years from now is smart because it'll only take, say, 15 months for the savings from gas and insurance driving the cheaper car to make up for the $6,000 lost by buying high and selling low.
Plus I'm going to have to pay sales tax on the used car replacement even though I just finished paying gobs of sales tax to buy the clown car.
Thanks for thoughts.
 
 

Joet

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Re: HELP! (I bought a Clown Car...)
« Reply #1 on: May 15, 2013, 01:43:25 PM »
can you set it on fire and collect the insurance? :)

matchewed

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Re: HELP! (I bought a Clown Car...)
« Reply #2 on: May 15, 2013, 01:48:11 PM »
I'd worry a bit less about all the small savings. Selling your decidedly wasteful vehicle now for something less wasteful is a good financial decision. Isn't that enough? The decision doesn't get any smarter the longer you wait. It is a wasteful vehicle, its cost of operation is going to be more than a more reasonable vehicle.

*edit*

Also that 6k is gone (wo)man. You will never get it back unless you can sell the car for the full price you bought it. Just go forward.
« Last Edit: May 15, 2013, 01:55:08 PM by matchewed »

Spork

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Re: HELP! (I bought a Clown Car...)
« Reply #3 on: May 15, 2013, 01:48:27 PM »
can you set it on fire and collect the insurance? :)

I know someone that did this.  The answer is "no."  His legal fees/jail time vastly outweighed the car cost.  (Yeah, I know you didn't mean for me to take you literally.)

Forcus

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Re: HELP! (I bought a Clown Car...)
« Reply #4 on: May 15, 2013, 01:55:33 PM »
If I sell it for, say, $36,000 next month, can anyone help me feel better about the math for how long it takes me to make up the $6,000 of lost money wasted on buying the Clown Car for a higher price than I am selling it for six/seven months later?

Recently thought about buying one (used of course). Decent ones in the 2011ish range for around $20k. My belief is that there weren't a whole lot of people buying $42k Tauruses so a lot of them were leased cheaply, and the prices depressed. What I am getting to is "lose" $6k now or a heck of a lot more later...

hurricane0884

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Re: HELP! (I bought a Clown Car...)
« Reply #5 on: May 15, 2013, 01:59:33 PM »
Just a quick calculation on gas costs alone. Assuming 5 trips back and forth to work only, 20MPg currently and 40MPG with the new car it would take 7 years to recover your "Lost" $6000.00. However, you can add it cheaper tires, oil, insurance, the investment return of the netted $25k all in all it would probably be about 3 years.

foobar

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Re: HELP! (I bought a Clown Car...)
« Reply #6 on: May 15, 2013, 02:11:11 PM »
If you could sell it for 36k, you would be the luckiest person out there.   Getting 30k is probably closer to the number you will get unless there is a real limited supply of these.  Ask yourself if you would pay 36k+ taxes to get a car with 6k miles or if you would get the brand new one for 42k. For a 2-3k difference most people would go with the new one.

But lost money is lost money. The only question going forward is what is cheaper for you.


So, last December I made a terrible decision. I bought a brand new 2013 Ford Taurus SHO sedan.  Some other facts.
- I paid for it with cash.
- I use it to drive back and forth to work (40 miles round trip).
- I am almost always its only passenger.
- It gets less than 20 mpg.
- Its insurance (liability + comp and collision) costs $101 /month.
So I think the only correct thing to do is to sell it and, since I am not yet in a position to bike to work (sorry), buy a used hatchback so I can get at least double that gas mileage.  And do all that as quickly and efficiently as possible.
Is that correct?
Also, I paid a total of something like $42,000 for the Taurus.  If I sell it for, say, $36,000 next month, can anyone help me feel better about the math for how long it takes me to make up the $6,000 of lost money wasted on buying the Clown Car for a higher price than I am selling it for six/seven months later?
I'm happy to be planning to put, say, $25,000 back into our liquid net worth (I'm thinking I'll spend ~$10,000 for my smarter car choice), but I'm also wanting to feel good that selling the Taurus tomorrow instead of two years from now is smart because it'll only take, say, 15 months for the savings from gas and insurance driving the cheaper car to make up for the $6,000 lost by buying high and selling low.
Plus I'm going to have to pay sales tax on the used car replacement even though I just finished paying gobs of sales tax to buy the clown car.
Thanks for thoughts.

Joet

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Re: HELP! (I bought a Clown Car...)
« Reply #7 on: May 15, 2013, 02:26:35 PM »
in the same situation as the OP [I bought a 335i, and chipped it, car is a beast like the SHO and it cost around the same]

my conclusion own it for 10-12+ years, ride my bike whenever I can. It's a $42k sunk cost and I'm ok with that. I dont know that I will ever buy a new car again, though.
But for a daily driver 12-second 1/4 capable car that handles better than anything I've ever owned and something that puts a smile on my face it's probably a fair deal. Just not one I plan on duplicating.

It probably would have made more sense to ditch it while it was still worth north of 30k and pick up a depressing succession of older civics if the analysis is based solely on increasing ones net worth [or rather, decreasing it less rapidly].

Paul der Krake

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Re: HELP! (I bought a Clown Car...)
« Reply #8 on: May 15, 2013, 03:51:56 PM »
The taurus is rated 19/29, which means a Mustachian driver should be getting lower thirties easily (hint: drive smoooooooth).

My .02: sell and buy a entry or mid-level sedan. 25k already gets you a lot of car these days.

Jamesqf

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Re: HELP! (I bought a Clown Car...)
« Reply #9 on: May 15, 2013, 11:08:03 PM »
It probably would have made more sense to ditch it while it was still worth north of 30k and pick up a depressing succession of older civics if the analysis is based solely on increasing ones net worth [or rather, decreasing it less rapidly].

Or ditch it and buy an older Miata, or hereabouts you can find decent older Porsches for under $15K.

Left

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Re: HELP! (I bought a Clown Car...)
« Reply #10 on: May 16, 2013, 12:18:16 AM »
hm, since you are in texas with nice weather (at least no snow), thought about a <$5k scooter. They can get around 80 mpg (at least the ones I looked at). That's 4 times the driving range per gallon of the car. It's cheaper to insure as well (if you give up having a car entirely). You could break even on in a few years even with the cost of the scooter factored in on just the difference in the mpg (not counting maintenance/insurance)

nktokyo

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Re: HELP! (I bought a Clown Car...)
« Reply #11 on: May 16, 2013, 12:21:14 AM »
Yup sell it. Don't forget the lesson.

Forcus

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Re: HELP! (I bought a Clown Car...)
« Reply #12 on: May 16, 2013, 09:17:01 AM »
I'm changing my response to "it depends". Because I am not close to FI yet, and I don't like / need reminders of the past, I say ditch it. If you are FI and you like to be reminded of your previous follies, maybe no harm in keeping it (the fact that you paid cash is important... I might have not been giving you credit). I will be super honest, the new SHO's are a Q-ship. 12's are easy and cheap, the cars are fast and comfortable (though a bit small inside for their Crown Vic girth) and get good mileage highway. If I lived / drove wide open spaces, I'd take an SHO over an econobox most any day of the week. My personal situation - backroads and twisty highways - I'm happier with my S-box Focus than I probably would be in an SHO. I am interested in hearing what you do... what might also change things is that if the car is worth, say, 28k, that's the value you have to compare against your cheaper alternatives (not 42k). Face it, that money is long gone!!

GagaHonk

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Re: HELP! (I bought a Clown Car...)
« Reply #13 on: May 16, 2013, 10:06:50 AM »
Thanks to everyone for the input and thoughts.  Super valuable feedback.  I've come around to being able to think about the problem like this, and am curious (again) whether this sounds more rational than what I was saying last time.
 
"If I had $30,000, would I buy the SHO I currently own and have $0 left in my hand/pocket, or would I buy a 2008 Prius for $15,000 and have $15,000 left in my hand/pocket."
 
My (easy) answer, today, is that I would do the latter.
 
So that's what I'm going to try to do.

Thanks again for the thoughts.  Damn stupid mistake.  I will plan to never forget this lesson.

unpolloloco

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Re: HELP! (I bought a Clown Car...)
« Reply #14 on: May 16, 2013, 10:22:06 AM »
The taurus is rated 19/29, which means a Mustachian driver should be getting lower thirties easily (hint: drive smoooooooth).

The SHO is 17/25.  Depending on commute characteristics, 20 may be entirely reasonable...

foobar

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Re: HELP! (I bought a Clown Car...)
« Reply #15 on: May 16, 2013, 01:05:04 PM »
A 15k porsche is going to cost you a lot more than a 15k civic over the next 10 years and the gas mileage isn't going to be much different than what he is driving.


It probably would have made more sense to ditch it while it was still worth north of 30k and pick up a depressing succession of older civics if the analysis is based solely on increasing ones net worth [or rather, decreasing it less rapidly].

Or ditch it and buy an older Miata, or hereabouts you can find decent older Porsches for under $15K.

GagaHonk

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Re: HELP! (I bought a Clown Car...)
« Reply #16 on: May 17, 2013, 09:50:02 AM »
Wow, taking action feels great.  Hopefully these were the start of a long series of better decisions to get us out of our excessive spending lifestyle.
Yesterday, I traded that Taurus for a 2008 Prius with 45,000 miles on it (should go another 100,000 miles easily, I figure) and a check for $15,500.*  And today I called our car insurance company and between getting out of that Clown Car into something more reasonable (but still too new and too expensive) and finding several other places we were wasting money on our car insurance I just cut our premiums by almost 1/3rd.
 

Forcus

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Re: HELP! (I bought a Clown Car...)
« Reply #17 on: May 17, 2013, 10:19:20 AM »
Wow, taking action feels great.  Hopefully these were the start of a long series of better decisions to get us out of our excessive spending lifestyle.
Yesterday, I traded that Taurus for a 2008 Prius with 45,000 miles on it (should go another 100,000 miles easily, I figure) and a check for $15,500.*  And today I called our car insurance company and between getting out of that Clown Car into something more reasonable (but still too new and too expensive) and finding several other places we were wasting money on our car insurance I just cut our premiums by almost 1/3rd.

Wow! You work fast.

Paul der Krake

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Re: HELP! (I bought a Clown Car...)
« Reply #18 on: May 17, 2013, 10:53:37 AM »
Good work! Doesn't it feel fantastic to get things done?

GagaHonk

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Re: HELP! (I bought a Clown Car...)
« Reply #19 on: May 17, 2013, 01:51:53 PM »
Thank you!  Yes, it feels terrific.  I don't know about working "fast," I guess.  We've been blessed with enough savings from my income over the past few years that if we weren't such degenerate overspenders (ridiculously, we spend basically my takehome from salary) we should've been living in an FI Mustachian paradise at least since 2009.
This site is terrific, and it's so great to have these forums be so active.  Every time I come back over to here to see if anyone has left comments on my question I have to scroll down twenty or thirty updated posts to find this one.  (I'm glad I used ALL CAPS for the first word of the Subject.  LOL.)
 
 

nktokyo

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Re: HELP! (I bought a Clown Car...)
« Reply #20 on: May 17, 2013, 05:28:00 PM »
Nice work.

Are you ready to get religion or is this a one-a-year church visit type of change?

Where else are you haemorrhaging money?