So currently DW and I have two paid off cars that are 7.5 and 9.5 years old that we purchased new. Both have about 100k miles on them, and with one of them (SUV, 7.5 yrs old) starting to have some higher maintenance expenses. Over the past week or so we've begun to wonder if we should go ahead and bite the bullet with a new car purchase.....
The car in question is a 2002 Nissan Xterra that gets 15 mpg (gas cost $1/g back then...oops) and probably will need ~$2k worth of work in the next 12 months if we keep it. It's worth about $4000-4500 in a trade-in or maybe $5000-5500 if we privately sell.
The reason we're considering now is two-fold: 1) Cash for Clunkers guarantees us at least $4500 value which avoids negotiating with the dealer, 2) new cars we're looking at have either a $1500 hybrid tax credit or equal dealer incentive thru Sept 30.
So guess I'm looking for opinions on if we should:
a) Pay for the repairs needed and drive it another 1-3 years.
b) Take the effort to try and sell personally before Cash for Clunkers expires in a few weeks, buy new with the incentives or used without
c) Keep it simple, forget about the extra $500-1000 we might be able to get selling privately, buy now and feel good about killing a car that gets only 15 mpg via Cash for Clunkers
I'm sure many folks will chime in and say (a) but the caveat is the older car we also have. It's in better shape but in another 2-4 years we'll likely need to replace it as well and perhaps better to stagger out the car purchases. It's also impossible to predict what incentives may be in place in future years vs the ones we know about now.
On a frugal / thrifty scale of 1-10 I'd say in general we're about an 8....willing to pass on many things but enjoy spending money where we can find value.
What say ye? 
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