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Comment by Aaargh20318 | Hacker News Reader

Aaargh20318

It's not just the 5% of the time you need it, it's also the immediate and guaranteed availability.

I rarely use my car, I'm the exact kind of person this is aimed at. I haven't used it in *monthts. But when I need it, it's there. There's car rental place about 500 meters walking distance from my home, but they aren't open 24/7. There is also a ride share car parked at about 1km from my home, but it's only one car and if someone else took it I can't use it.

These things only work when you know well in advance you're going to use it and even then, they might not be available at peak times. There's only so many ride share cars available, and if everyone wants to visit their parents on Christmas, there's not enough of them. Car rental companies aren't going to buy enough cars to cover their 5% peak use either.

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> I rarely use my car, I'm the exact kind of person this is aimed at. I haven't used it in monthts. But when I need it, it's there.

If those months are not hyperbole, you might find that when you need it, it doesn't start. (That just happened last week to a friend of mine who had to bring his kid to swimming class, after leaving the car unused for a few weeks.)

A jump-start kit/powerbank that charges from USB costs $20.

It addresses this problem 99% of the time.

Other parts will also suffer after this long. The battery, but also the tires, the brakes, the fuel etc.

Sounds like you think its worth it but I would never spend hundreds of dollars a month in payments and insurance on something I don't use for months.

So you don’t have health insurance?

I'm American so any questions about health insurance automatically are predisposed towards absurdity. But yeah, I do. I don't want to be stuck in a hospital with a multi thousand dollar medical bill for an emergency. The worst that would happen without me owning a car is needing to rent one on a moment's notice. Maybe there's the odd moment when I would need a car for a city-wide evacuation? Seems like that's such an exceptional case that I would not spend my money maintaining a car just to be prepared for it.

Like another poster said it’s about 65/mo all in for a cheaper car, and personal preference is all that really matters.

That is the trade off you made. It might not be right for the next person. There are things you cannot do with a rental car (off road). There are times when you cannot get a rental car when you want it. If you have hundreds of dollars per months that you are not spending anyway it might be worth it. (though my yearly costs for my truck that I drive a few times a year are much less than $100/month - it is paid for years ago though)

> I would never spend hundreds of dollars a month in payments and insurance on something I don't use for months

Neither would I.

I paid €2600 for my car (2007 Mitsubishi Colt), about 20 euros a month for insurance, and 26 a month in road tax.

It's shocking to me how cheap used cars are (equivalently - how few people buy them).

I am doing exactly the same thing as you. Bought a ~$3k old used car that is always there for me. I do use it more often, ever week or two, though.

It is even more shocking to me that people would buy a car on credit (except when it has a business purpose, i.e. you can comfortably cover interest payments with the increase in revenue). You're not supposed to use credit for consumption!

$4,500 2005 Toyota Corolla here...

I put 80,000 miles on it in 2 years... I think I got my money's worth.

Low mileage/late model used cars can be relatively expensive. "Clunkers" can be quite cheap but it's a bit of a crap shoot. Donated my old high mileage 2nd car (fortunately) before the pandemic hit. For some new tires and a brake job it would probably have kept going for a few more years but, especially if you want to take longer drives, old vehicles inspire less and less faith and take more and more time.

You just buy a second "clunker" should problems happen. You have about 10 attempts before a breakeven :)

It's kind of like shorting the market with OTM options. The eventual payout can easily cover years of "failures".

All of those failures consume time and energy, possibly wasted vacation, missed work, uncomfortable situations, etc. I've had used cars but at this point I'm willing to pay a considerable premium for maximizing reliable transportation.

It's not shocking. New cars are more convenient and reliable. If you are going on a road trip and the car breaks down it's a major pain and expense.

Secondly there is a huge difference in safety.

>Secondly there is a huge difference in safety

On a three year old car? I really doubt it.

I actually looked up statistics from my country’s equivalent of the AAA of the road-side breakdowns they service before I bought it. The Mitsubishi Colt I own is one of the most reliable cars you can get. Japanese cars in general are very reliable.

The only reason to buy new is if you have some sort of aversion towards someones boogers on the wheel and fart dust in the seat. We bought a 2018 toyota for 9k out the door. Nearly 10k off msrp for 2 years used.

Credit is fine if the interest rate is low and you aren't stretching yourself financially. I could've bought my car in cash if I wanted to but at a 2.5% interest rate I figured why bother, that's almost nothing after inflation. I might as well just keep the money invested in the market.

Why don't you just borrow money to buy stocks, without involving the car?

You can get lower rate if you use your own stocks as collateral, i.e. if you use brokerage margin. Heck, these days margin lending is so crazy common that there are even ETFs that package leveraged equities for you to go anywhere between -300% via 0% to 300% long, just change the allocation with a few clicks (or taps on your phone).

Leveraged ETFs returns diverge rapidly from the package of equity + margin loan since the former rebalance daily.

Leveraged ETFs are almost never appropriate except to monetize a very short term view.

The obligation is fixed, but the future is not. This is the real danger.

Old used cars are great most of the time, but they sometimes break for no reason, or require non-trivial work (e.g. replacing struts or wheel bearings, that sort of stuff). This is of course not a problem if you live in a single family house and have plenty of space to store the necessary tools and to work on it, but if you go all in into the lifestyle of living in a condo downtown that's recommended by the author of the article above, this can turn into huge and expensive hassle.

Use some of the money saved from not buying a new car. Or buy a second cheap car :)

This has been my strategy for last 12 years. I own a 17 year old Volvo XC wagon and a 16 year old Toyota Camry. Volvo I bought 13 years ago from a 96 year old gent who's family had taken away the keys. Bought it sight-unseen on Craiglist for $9000. I'd put it up against any modern SUV for looks and functionality (except smartphone integration). The Toyota was $4500 and had 30K miles.

The Volvo heads to the shop on Wednesday. I'm concerned that I'm in for an expensive bill from the mechanic (~$1000) for various ailments. Never an easy analysis on a car with a KBB value of like $2500. But on the other hand, I'm driving a $40K car.

Another benefit of second used car is that if friends and family come to visit, they have a car to use.

I did a similar move but ended up buying a lemon.

Still, despite so far putting 150% of the "value" into repairs I realize it does not matter. Large Ratios of a small number are nothing compared to even small ratios of a large number.

Once the repairs are done I get to know the state of those parts. Absolute worst case, and the engine needs replacement, we're still only talking about 1 year worth of depreciation on a new car.

Will I need to replace the engine? Likely not. Would it have been slightly cheaper to spend 2x on a better used car? Sure, but maybe that one would have been a lemon too.

The scary part of used cars is spending money on repairs. Yet even expensive repairs are cheap. They are only expensive relative to the market value, but the market value is based on that lemon market risk.

The end result of having bought a far too cheap lemon: I've still spent less than a properly vetted vehicle and now I know some good mechanics down the street. The vehicle itself now has parts which are known quantities.

I'd really love an excuse to buy a new car. I've got the cash for it, but nothing modern cars can provide justify paying an engine replacement of depreciation every year.

>I'd really love an excuse to buy a new car

I look for that excuse myself regularly now.

I think the biggest "excuse" is new accident avoidance tech. A friend last year hit a bear. She didn't see the bear but her Subaru did, and probably saved her life.

I'd do the same if parking here wasn't 100$ a month.

In the city that the author is writing from, car insurance can cost between $100 and $300 for minimum coverage on most cars unless you've been driving for a substantial amount of time crash-free. Likewise, gas is about $1.3 to $1.6/L

I'd pay about the same as your car for parking in my building for a year. Luckily rideshares are way more common around here, and I can often find one at walking distance (or else I can uber/ride my bike or a rideshare bike to one).

As I read the article, I compare the author's world view to that of the "survivalists" and "preppers". The guys who stockpile food, water, ammo, etc. that they'll likely never use but might. They deliberately optimize for the 5% or 0.5%, rather than the 95%. They assume independence will eventually be needed (running water may one day be unavailable), where the author is willing to risk relying on inter-dependence (car rentals and hotels will always be available). The survivalists firmly espouse the "when I need it, it's there" point of view. I don't know if one view is right or wrong, but they are clearly opposite approaches to dealing with tail risk.

Preppers do what they because it is fun for them. This is same thing that drives the author. It is fun for him and his family.

We have a decent sized yard, and my right now my wife is planting a fig tree because that is fun for her.

> they might not be available at peak times...

That's what surge pricing is for.

It saddens me to see your correct answer being voted down. I get there's a moral condemnation of surge prices in certain circles.

Nonetheless this condemnation, once legislated, have removed the very practical ability to purchase important services or goods when they matter the most to you. Instead we end up all over-buying just to ensure we have it at the key junction.

On first glance I didn't like the sound of it either. But then I thought, it really does give you a choice you wouldn't otherwise have.

If surge pricing doesn't exist and all cars are taken, you're simply SOL, period.

The price is irrelevant if there is literally zero supply. Market mechanisms only work on longer time scales.

Even on a short time scale, as prices get higher, many people will discover that they have some alternatives or can wait a while, leaving the product available to those who really, really need it.

At which point it starts to make sense for them to choose own their own copy, securing their freedom from the tyranny of such false-sharing.

Have you tried to order an uber from a suburb that isn't very near the city center? You wait 20 minutes while you watch them drive from the airport to your house, and half the time the driver cancels the ride after you've been waiting for 15 minutes when they realize how far you are from the airport where all the fares in the area typically come from.

This only works when supply is big enough.

In small towns or bigger villages, the number of taxis/ubers, whatever might only be around 10 to 20. Once they are gone, you have to wait till they are a viable again.

Do you buy car insurance by the hour?

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