If only one vehicle, which one?

[aaronc879]

I had two vehicles for a couple years and hated juggling the two. I sold one private party and traded in the other one when I bought my new small SUV(kia Seltos). For me, a small SUV with AWD is the ideal vehicle but that doesn't mean it is for everyone.

 

[CincyDave]

Is there no love here for the minivan? We have a Honda Odyssey and a Lexus RX350. If I was forced to go to one vehicle, I'd rather have the minivan. Better gas mileage, much more cargo space and seats 8. We absolutely need the room when we go on vacation, as I take enough fishing gear for ten people. The only advantage the SUV has is all wheel drive, but if roads are bad, we don't go out anyhow. We don't tow anything, so that's not a consideration for us.

Flame away! LOL

 

[rk911]

if we had to pick just one...a mid-sized suv. i'd rather have it even if i end up never needing it.

 

[kgtest]

This is completely personal but in your shoes I'd swap out for a 4Runner soon. The safety boost you get with enhanced driver assist ,airbag numbers and sheer weight could save your life or prevent a crippling injury. As we get older we need every edge we can get. Bodies break easier, mend more slowly and our reflexes just aren't at 100% anymore (hard to admit but true)

I'll never forget I met a guy doing some business and he said he would never go lighter than a 3/4 ton truck from now on. I asked why? He said he got into a wreck with his 1/2 ton truck and injured the other driver badly to the point where they required 24/hr care. Had he been in a 3/4 ton it would have just been a funeral. He held guilt for personally diminishing there quality of life to a living vegetable and wished he had just sent them on their way. I thought it was an interesting perspective and couldn't imagine being in his shoes.

 

[RetiredAt55.5]

Is there no love here for the minivan? We have a Honda Odyssey and a Lexus RX350. If I was forced to go to one vehicle, I'd rather have the minivan. Better gas mileage, much more cargo space and seats 8. We absolutely need the room when we go on vacation, as I take enough fishing gear for ten people. The only advantage the SUV has is all wheel drive, but if roads are bad, we don't go out anyhow. We don't tow anything, so that's not a consideration for us.

Flame away! LOL

Ok.

Minivans have great utility.

However, life is too short for a one vehicle minivan.

 

[Physics Guy]

It's a tough choice. I feel a minivan is overall superior to an SUV but there aren't any BEV minivans and if I was being forced to go for one vehicle I'd want a BEV. Which means something like the Ioniq 5 would be it right now.

 

[Andre1969]

I'm one of those somewhat old fashioned types that likes having a car and a truck. Any vehicle that tries to combine the two usually ends up resulting in some kind of compromise. But, if I had to go down to one vehicle, it would probably be a full-sized, extended cab pickup. It would at least have a back seat large enough for occasional use, and if I put the tailgate down and just learn to start tying stuff, it would mostly make up for lack of a true 8-foot bed.

 

[donheff]

We have had one car for a couple of decades. Always a compact SUV that will fit in our tiny garage and have a hitch for our bike rack (and previously a jet ski). The last two have been hybrids. As Old Shooter said, it's a tool. Our tool need to be both small and capable of carrying bikes on trips.

 

[CincyDave]

Ok.

Minivans have great utility.

However, life is too short for a one vehicle minivan.

Yeah, I can't really argue there. One of these days, I'm going to get something really fast. Trouble with the fast sports cars, I can hardly get in and out of them

There are some hot SUVs though.....Hmmmm.

 

[mf15]

Great headlights are a must. Would be nice to put more utility back into a SUV,
such as a rear window that opens,not many small ones have it. Bronco.
Real spare tire. Had to drive on a donut once, did not like it at all.
Oldmike

 

[calmloki]

I did a remarkable amount of rental maintenance with a 3cylinder Chevy Sprint. Could and did tie 20' long PVC pipe over the roof and sticking out fore and aft. Lumber could go from passenger footwells diagonally back to the hatch. Toilets and lawnmower with folded handle fit easily with the hatch latched. Could park it in store lots with tools worth multiples of what I had invested in the car - unlocked! - and feel fully secure. I won't say that roadside panhandlers offered me coins, but it wasn't far off. The car was a mechanical Sardinian donkey.
After going through a BMW wagon phase - way more fun but it feels bad to subject that car to some indignities - we ended up with a Mazda CX5. Regular gas vs Premium is nice and the cubic feet of load capacity is close, but the big factor is it puts the gal up in the air where she can see. The Mazda is our back and forth to Cali car while the BMW sits in the garage in Oregon. Both cars have hitches, but our 4x8 trailer is up north and not as convenient as just getting a whim and throwing a random couch or wood stove in the back of a rig that would accept it. It is easier to back into the CX5 seat or swing my legs out and stand up vs. hoisting myself out of the sport suspension BMW wagon.

Upshot: we've done the one car on site thing for 6 months at a time and probably the BMW will go away.

 

[kgtest]

We have had one car for a couple of decades. Always a compact SUV that will fit in our tiny garage and have a hitch for our bike rack (and previously a jet ski). The last two have been hybrids. As Old Shooter said, it's a tool. Our tool need to be both small and capable of carrying bikes on trips.

Good point on the tool. I've been able to make a lot of money, and save some money by owning my trucks, but they come with higher cost of ownership. Bigger, so harder to wash and store. Tires cost more. Oil changes cost more. But very convenient when I need to haul or tow.

 

[pacergal]

Is there no love here for the minivan? We have a Honda Odyssey and a Lexus RX350. If I was forced to go to one vehicle, I'd rather have the minivan. Better gas mileage, much more cargo space and seats 8. We absolutely need the room when we go on vacation, as I take enough fishing gear for ten people. The only advantage the SUV has is all wheel drive, but if roads are bad, we don't go out anyhow. We don't tow anything, so that's not a consideration for us.

Flame away! LOL

We loved our Toyota Sienna when we had it. 15 years and 250,000+ miles. Great family vehicle. Really thought about another when we replaced it, but went with a sedan as we had no kids and kids stuff to haul anymore.

 

[MRG]

Great headlights are a must. Would be nice to put more utility back into a SUV,
such as a rear window that opens,not many small ones have it. Bronco.
Real spare tire. Had to drive on a donut once, did not like it at all.
Oldmike

DW has said after this Wrangler she'd like to check out a Bronco. I ran behind one up a pass in my model Y. I normally pass everything on that hill, I caught them, thought about passing, but they were doing 90mph up the mountain and I didn't want to drive that fast.

 

[Mr._Graybeard]

Good point on the tool. I've been able to make a lot of money, and save some money by owning my trucks, but they come with higher cost of ownership. Bigger, so harder to wash and store. Tires cost more. Oil changes cost more. But very convenient when I need to haul or tow.

Car nuts I know refer to most mainstream Japanese models as an "appliance." It's a slur in those circles.

But it's correct that they are tools. Sad to say, a vehicle with higher profile is a factor in function these days because everybody else is driving a @#@#$ SUV, pickup or crossover. You just can't see around them in parking lots or at intersections.

I recently opted for a 2021 Ford Ranger, with 4WD for extra elevation. Now I have a perch above everybody else. I may add a lift. (j/k)

 

[RetMD21]

In another thread, “Reducing number of autos”, the following comment caught my attention:



Which got me to thinking - If I did downsize to one vehicle, what type of vehicle would it be? The above statement kind of surprised me because I would think a small suv would be a great multi purpose vehicle. I have a truck and an Equinox (small suv) and if I moved to one vehicle, I’d have to keep the Equinox. It’s not ideal for hauling, but it will haul better than a sedan. It also gets pretty good mileage and is not a bad road car.

So we got DW an Ecosport with the idea that it would be an around town car for her with <5,000 miles per year for 10 years. The cost was low to begin with and we happened into a deal on an early lease return vehicle that was 6 months old. I was thinking of something like an Avalon hybrid for myself. The Ecosport is not great on the highway. The gas milage and acceleration are both mediocre. We ended up as a one car couple and found by accident rather than plan that it worked great for us. If we had an Equinox or better yet a PIH Escape we would have been satisfied. Almost all automobiles are a compromise. In Michigan it is good to have a vehicle that can handle snow and potholes. We are on track for 20k miles of road trips/ year. We are inclined toward a somewhat larger crossover type SUV hybrid or PIH possibly Toyota/KIA/Hyundai.

 

[CO-guy]

We have had one car for a couple of decades. Always a compact SUV that will fit in our tiny garage and have a hitch for our bike rack (and previously a jet ski). The last two have been hybrids. As Old Shooter said, it's a tool. Our tool need to be both small and capable of carrying bikes on trips.

Agreed. We live in a remote mountainous area with just one compact SUV. Our garage is actually huge (oversized bays and 10' ceilings). We built it to accommodate work vehicles, campers, or trailered toys parked behind vehicles. However, we've found that our little SUV meets all of our needs.

Habitat restoration work we do in the summer often involves a lot of driving on rough forestry roads. To meet those demands, we installed oversized off-road tires, rock slider and steel skid plates to completely cover the motor, center link and transfer case, a steel rear bumper with more accessible recovery hooks and an integrated hitch mount, and aftermarket springs that added about an inch to the overall height of the vehicle. More importantly, they maintain most of that added height even when our little SUV is fully loaded with dogs, bikes, and camping gear. On forestry roads, the short narrow wheelbase performs like a champ. Handling on pavement is actually improved with the stiffer springs and fuel economy changed little (1-2 mpg).

Having just one vehicle works for us because we pretty much walk, bike, or take public transit everywhere most days. It's also allowed us to avoid having any car payments for over 2 decades now which has made it possible to save more quickly for ER.

 

[MC Rider]

I will say a motorcycle. One of the "do everything" types. With side and top cases. Because I love bikes, and 4 wheelers are just appliances.

I will argue that you can rent a 4 wheeler if you need one pretty easy in most places. Renting a motorcycle, not so much. Believe me I have looked into it.

Also will claim a loophole here, DW insists on having her own 4 wheel vehicle. So we would just need to drop 1 car. Not that long ago I had 3 bikes, and I had that count for a bunch of years. So we have cut that back some.


Also, is a trailer considered a vehicle? Not an RV trailer., just a smallish one.

 

[rodi]

We sort of downsized to one car recently. When the kids were living under roof (as recently as last summer), we had my 2017 subie forester, hubby's 2019 rav4, and a 1999 ford f150 that the boys shared. Older son took the f150 with him when he moved out (though we still own it, it's too far away for us to use.) In the meantime we purchased/inherited a 2000 dodge ram 1500 xl van. We've had fun turning it into a poor persons camper. (We call it the scooby van, since we painted it out like the Mystery Machine from Scooby doo). It rarely gets used except when we're camping. A few months ago we sold my subie to fund solar panels and leave enough to buy a beater car if younger son needs a car.

So, technically we have 3 cars - but only the rav4 is used as daily driver and shared between us. We just took the van out for an 11 day camping trip... but it's not a daily driver.

 

[geeky_grrl]

I'll never forget I met a guy doing some business and he said he would never go lighter than a 3/4 ton truck from now on. I asked why? He said he got into a wreck with his 1/2 ton truck and injured the other driver badly to the point where they required 24/hr care. Had he been in a 3/4 ton it would have just been a funeral. He held guilt for personally diminishing there quality of life to a living vegetable and wished he had just sent them on their way. I thought it was an interesting perspective and couldn't imagine being in his shoes.

I was in a bad accident a number of years ago when I was a passenger in a Ford Ranger and we got hit head-on by a 3/4 ton truck. Not as bad as the one above, but I had badly broken leg, a week in the hospital, and months of rehab. I'm really nervous in a vehicle smaller than a truck or SUV after that experience. If we had been in our smaller car that day it would have been a lot worse.

 

[Sunset]

Is there no love here for the minivan? We have a Honda Odyssey and a Lexus RX350. If I was forced to go to one vehicle, I'd rather have the minivan. Better gas mileage, much more cargo space and seats 8. We absolutely need the room when we go on vacation, as I take enough fishing gear for ten people. ..

+1
We use our van for all the long trips as it's only got 54K on it, and it can pack a LOT inside nice and dry.
It's gas mileage avgs about 26 mpg on long trips where I drive 70->75 m/h

But since we only drive about 6K miles per year, gas mileage doesn't really matter.

I only wish it could tow regular RV as I might want to try that one day, but it's limit is 3500 lbs.

 

[Navigator]

The answer seems obvious to me - a Mazda Miata!

 

[DrRoy]

We had an Equinox, but replaced it with a Honda CRV which we liked better. When we wanted more cargo space with equal fuel economy, we got a Toyota Highlander Hybrid.

 

[ncbill]

Is there no love here for the minivan? We have a Honda Odyssey and a Lexus RX350. If I was forced to go to one vehicle, I'd rather have the minivan. Better gas mileage, much more cargo space and seats 8. We absolutely need the room when we go on vacation, as I take enough fishing gear for ten people. The only advantage the SUV has is all wheel drive, but if roads are bad, we don't go out anyhow. We don't tow anything, so that's not a consideration for us.

Flame away! LOL

I would keep our 2004 DGC minivan over our 2007 year old Suburban.

Maintenance on the latter has cost several times that of the former.