How long do you plan to keep your car?

[pacergal]

We keep ours as long as possible, until repairs are too frequent/costly.
We replaced both just before retirement, one had over 200,000, one had 250,000.
These will last us quite a while, as we are not driving near as many miles.

 

[pb4uski]

Great question and one I have been thinking about since our 2016 Outback has 45k miles and I'd like something a little bigger. Historically we have kept cars to 75-100k miles as long as they continued to be reliable... so that would be another 2-3 years for the Outback. While I really like the car, the only thing that I don't like is that you have to fiddle around a bit to get 4 people and 4 sets of golf clubs in it... and there are times when we could use seating for 6.

A couple friends have Buick Enclave and a Ford Explorer and those you can flip do the third row seat and easily and conveniently get 4 bags of golf clubs and 4 people in easily or flip the seats up to transport 6. If we do go bigger, I might lean towards the new Subaru Ascent or the Honda Pilot... but they are all a lot of $$$$. Gulp!

 

[omni550]

I have a 2006 Toyota Highlander with 156,000 miles. I'm planning on keeping it until the maintenance costs are too high and/or it becomes unreliable. I drive it the ~1,400 miles each way to/from winter condo in Florida plus a lot of shorter trips to visit friends, etc.

I'm hoping to get an autonomous vehicle as my next car, but not sure when they'll be widely available.

omni

 

[treypar]

We plan to keep our two new 2017 cars for at least ten years. We only drive 5-6,000 miles a year now so it may be longer. I do like the technology upgrades from our former cars which were 9 and 13 years old. Maybe we will not need to own a car in the future and these vehicles will be the last cars that we own.

 

[ProspectiveBum]

We buy new, and keep them a minimum of 10 years. Cars are so well-made these days (and our SoCal climate is so mild that rust isn’t an issue), we find we’re keeping them longer. Our current vehicles are a 2000 SUV, and a 2005 minivan.

Our oldest will start driving in a couple of years, and she’ll likely get the SUV as a first car. It’s no-frills, heavy and slow, and should be an ideal first car for a young driver. At that point, we’ll buy a new vehicle for DW, and will be a 3 vehicle family.

The van is the best overall vehicle we’ve ever owned. It’s at 175K miles, and still runs great. Barring any huge repair bills, we’ll likely keep it until both kids are off to college. So we’ll probably end up getting 20 years out of each of our current vehicles. DW wants a Toyota pickup as her next vehicle. Based on reputation, that should easily go 20 years, too. Geez, if we don’t change something in our buying habits, I probably only have a couple of new cars left!

 

[FIREd]

I usually keep mine until the upkeep becomes too expensive or too frequent. But the last 2 cars were sold because of life circumstances:

* my 2010 Toyota Camry was sold in 2015 (< 30,000 miles) because it was sitting in the garage way too often. We had moved to downtown San Francisco and we did not need a car to get around anymore.
* I will be selling my 2018 Mazda 3 in a few weeks (~ 13,000 miles) because I am moving overseas and it would have been too costly to take the car with me. Had I known I would be moving again, I would not have purchased it (I'll take a big hit on depreciation).

I think that my new car will be an Audi A3 Quattro (new or 1-2 years old) and I plan on keeping it a while (and this time I know that I won't be moving again in a long while).

 

[RE2Boys]

We generally keep our cars about 7 years.....buy used and keep until about 10 years old. As many have mentioned, technology and safety features (combined with the road salt in this area) govern the decision to upgrade. In 2016 sold two vehicles (both 2005 models) and bought three.(2010,2011,and 2012).....moved from front wheel drive/front airbags to AWD and side curtain airbags on all. Two older ones were for my college sons.
In early 2018 the 2012 Hyundia Santa Fe (56K miles) was totaled by a deer. For the first time, I spent more that $20K on a car (not by much $22K). My wife now has a 2017 Hyundai Santa Fe AWD with 30K miles. Dealer had it on the lot for six months and priced to move.

 

[Ronstar]

I plan on keeping my 2001 corvette forever. It has less than 90k miles, and I’m only putting a few thousand miles on it a year. It’s fiberglass so it won’t rust.

Also plan on keeping my 2017 Ford F150 forever. It’s aluminum so it won’t rust and I don’t put too many miles on it.

DW’s 2012 Acura has 65k miles. Probably replace it when it gets to 10 years old in 2022.

 

[imoldernu]

96 Cadillac, 82K mi. 98 Lincoln 105Kmi.. Both now old enough to drink, and still pretty.

Will keep >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> forever!

 

[SheitlQueen]

I keep it until it is no longer reliable. My last car was 16 years old and had 321,000 miles on it when I decided to finally replace it. It was still running, and I actually gave it to my nephew. He is still driving it.

 

[Jeffman52]

Cars depreciate so quickly that I tend to keep them as long as possible. I drive a 2002 F150 (So 16 years old). I figure every year I keep it past the payoff date is like putting extra money in my pocket. I will say that I recently moved from Georgia to Ohio and I may need to trade just to get a 4X4. The light truck bed on the 2WD makes it a bit scary to drive in the winter when the weather gets iffy.

I also have a 2015 CRV that we bought when we gifted our 2004 CRV to our daughter. Daughter is still driving the 04, its still in good shape. We plan to keep the 2015 at least 10 years. Maybe more.

I look at it this way. Assuming I don't pay cash for a car. If I have to put 500 or even 1000 dollars into repairs, that's just a few car payments in the scheme of things. Even if I pay cash, which I would. I look at the longer term picture. Now when I get a bit older, I might look at my personal safety (not being stranded) as a higher priority and stay in newer vehicles.

 

[W2R]

The car I have now is the best car I've ever had but it's 11 years old and has 110k+ miles, this car should last me another 40-50k without too many problems (unless I get bit by the new car bug).

For those of you getting the most out of every dollar, when do you plan to upgrade? Is it when you reach a certain amount of miles, age or when it becomes too cost prohibitive to keep repairing?

My 2009 Toyota Venza has 29,700 miles on it.

In the spirit of "Blow that Dough", I wanted to get a new SUV this year, but couldn't find one that I like any better than what I already have. Oh well!

I don't like to keep a car once it starts needing frequent repairs, at all. My Venza really hasn't needed any (yet). Mileage is still relatively low, too.

I am beginning to think that its age is an advantage for me. I hate vehicle with excessive electronics loaded on them and as bad as my Venza is for that, this type of thing seems to be getting even worse in more recent car models.

So, what will trigger buying my next car? Simple. If/when I see a brand new car that I like better than what I already have, and actually WANT, I'll buy it just because I can. So far, no cars fit that description.

 

[DAYDREAMER]

I hope our newest car (2014 Ford Escape) last long enough to get us to cars that drive themselves. We love all the bells and whistles of new car technology. Our other vehicles are a 1996 Ram/cummins 4x4 truck with 220k miles and a 2004 Honda Accord with 175k. The older cars feel naked without the fancy technology, but keep running good.

We traded in a 1993 Honda Accord with 350k miles on it when we bought the escape in 2014. Got a whopping $400 for the trade in! Eh, we got our money's worth out of it, and I hate selling stuff to people.

 

[ncbill]

I have too many vehicles (most from older relatives who stopped driving) given our family's size.

A couple are over two decades old, even the newest are over a decade old.

The 15-year-old minivan has started leaking (or consuming) oil.

If the above is not a cheap fix (i.e. not paying to disassemble the engine) then it will be retired, probably in favor of a mid-sized SUV.

 

[FI_RElater]

...this

We buy new and keep cars for 8-11 years based on past history. Most of our cars were over 100K miles when traded in, the highest was 164K (Honda Prelude). What determines when we trade varies based on several factors - past reliability, change in desired utility, new alternatives, etc.

always figured eight years was break even, ten plus was optimal. The biggest factor was reliability

we bought new vehicle for DW just before retirement, when we knew we needed something different, in this case AWD, and something more reliable than the older vehicle we had; gave the old one to of DW siblings for their kids use. did same thing with my earlier replacement vehicle. (both are still working but needed some minor work to maintain. Earlier vehicles we just traded in because we knew that they were going to cost too much to bring back to a reliable state).

 

[HF63]

I tent to keep cars for a long time, I do all the maintenance and they get to be just like my children. Here are some of the current rides:


1. 93/ 850 gave it to my sister at 250K, kept it for 19 years.
2. 95/ 850 wagon just gave it to my nephews to drive to school at 369K, had it 20 years.
3. 97/ 960 wife's car currently 151K, about 10 years with us
4. 98/ S70 T5 manual trans, 120K and 6 years. Going to keep it for ever. Turbo is blast to drive.
5. 2004/ CRV Mom's CRV that my son inherited 3 years ago.


I find it hard to make any changes to current rides but the loco in me wants a full electric car just to learn something knew.

 

[Luvdogs]

We have a 2007 Lexus SUV with 190K miles. Runs fine. Largest problem was when the alternator went about a year ago; made the car die a few miles from home. Took it to Pep Boys, $1000 later it was fine. Then it died again about a week later; stranded us an hour away. Tow guy from AAA said it was a wire that needed to be cleaned off and questioned whether the alternator was actually bad in the first place. Has been fine since but will probably get a new one (smaller Lexus SUV) within a year.

Have a 1985 Jeep CJ with about 60K miles original owner. Will probably keep until DH cannot climb up into it anymore. I haven't been in it for 5+ years.

2014 vette; 15K miles will keep for a long time.

 

[freedomatlast]

I currently own eight vehicles. They are a mix of American, Japanese and German nameplates. The newest is a 2018, and the oldest is a 1970. The lowest mileage one has is 4,500 miles and the highest mileage one has 286,000 miles. Cost to repair is never really an issue since I do most repairs and maintenance myself. I consider all of them very reliable and would drive any one of them across the country. All are well maintained by me. I just keep each of them till I want something else more. When it comes time to sell one or two, I sell them directly to the next owner instead of trading them in.

 

[chilkoot]

I have a 1998 Toyota 4Runner which runs well and which I’ve kept in good shape. No really compelling reason to keep it other than occasionally I want a big carrying capacity and it’s nice to have it close at hand.
Also have a 2008 Infiniti which I still like better than anything else out there, including the models that supplanted it. Due to a health issue I didn’t drive it for a four year period, so it’s got really low miles. I’ll probably keep it until some other model catches my eye and I think i’d enjoy that more.

 

[Katsmeow]

It depends. Currently we have a new car that we just bought a month ago (2018 Volvo XC60) that replaced a car that we had had just over 6 years. In that case, we were wanting to get an SUV to replace a car.

Our second car is a Ford Explorer that has more miles on it than the one replaced and we have had it 7 years. But it is a larger SUV and is useful to us to keep. It has a little over 100,000 miles on it. However, it just quit starting for some unknown reason and is in the shop. Maybe we should have replaced it...

In practice, the new car will be the daily driver and the older car will be used either when we need the larger SUV or DH is driving by himself without me.

I do believe in replacing a car for safety features. I expect to replace the Ford Explorer in about 3 years although that could change if it continues to need a lot of work.

 

[travelover]

I'm keeping my 1981 Checker until no parts are available or I can't pull myself off the floor and into the driver's seat by clutching the steering wheel.

 

[Helena]

.

I'm blessed with a wonderful reliable Honda Civic that I have driven for 14 years. I'll continue to drive it as long as it stays reliable.

 

[Drake3287]

We have two car's and replace them every 10 years, 5 years apart from each other. This way we always have one newer car with less possible issues for long trips.

Next year it's my turn to get a new truck. I'll be selling my 2010 F150 SuperCrew 4x4 with only 80,000 miles and show room condition. Somebody will get a great used truck with low miles and I'm sure it'll sell within hours on Craigslist.

Not the best financial decision but luckily I have the funds to do it.

 

[ugeauxgirl]

I am driving a nearly 4 year old Mazda 6. It has about 50K miles, and I'm very happy with it. In 18 months or so my oldest son will be 16. I had planned on passing it to him at some point, but he just applied for a STEM high school that is a boarding school. If he gets in, he wouldn't be allowed to have a car there till senior year, so I might not get that Subaru Outback I've been eyeing for a little longer...

 

[kitesurfer2]

I just got the call. $15,500 estimate. pretty sure i'll get another or a Miata again. ran through a herd of deer, hitting one Xgiving eve. I had Miata's before the Vette.