Most folks believe that hybrids are frugal. If only it were so. Hybrids carry a price premium worth their weight in cadmium. Despite over a million sold, it’s damn hard to find a good deal on one. In five years of searching I’ve only found three solitary steals. Conventional gassers though can be as cheap to buy as a wore out mop. Name your brand (within reason). Name your size. If you’re patient enough, you can almost name your price. Gas beaters are truly cheap to buy. But to own . . .
The beater beats the hybrid 90+% of the time. Depreciation. Insurance. Purchase price. Parts cost. Even the opportunity cost that comes with socking money in a depreciating status symbol works heavily in the uncouth beater’s favor. Most folks who drive 15,000 miles a year will save anywhere from $650 to $800 a year in gas assuming they get 45 mpg with the hybrid vs. 25 with the gas engine ($2.50 to $3.00 per gallon). But then comes the raiding of the piggy bank for rainy days.
Let’s use a beater par excellence Volvo 940 as an example. A very well kept Volvo 940 with low miles will fetch about $2000 to $2500 retail. A 1st generation Honda Civic Hybrid will typically go for about $6500 if it’s a 2003 with moderate miles or a 2005 highway driver. Let’s assume a $4,000 difference between the two. By the way these are simple estimates and I’m forecasting an eight year period of ownership.
Depreciation expense for the eight year period will favor the Volvo by about $400 a year ($650 vs. $250). The Honda sells at $2500 (to an aspiring yuppie). The Volvo sells at $500 (to an aspiring hippie). Opportunity cost? That’s another $200+ if you’re realizing a 5% return on the $4000 difference in purchase price. A bond fund invested in moderate risk corporate bonds should yield that as a post-tax return over the long run.
Thank you Steven Lang for continually justifying my choice to keep a pair of old Volvo 240s (’82 and ’88) on the road as my daily drivers.
This is a premise with which I agree with. As good as hybrids are, a beater wins hands down.
The Carbon footprint is already paid off.
Because you’re already driving a car which has been produced, that means the resources to make a new car can be saved.
And you can achieve a comparable mileage to a hybrid.
The only downsides are that:
You’ll lose the feeling of owning a new car.
The new car will be better equipped.
The new car will be more safer. A definite consideration if you’re going to be carrying your family in it.
That’s why I choose to keep my Toyota Yaris 2004, rather than buy a hybrid. It gets close to 50mpg, has a Euro NCAP rating of 4 stars and the carbond footprint is already paid off. Makes more sense.
This is why cash for clunkers had absolutely nothing to do with being environmentally friendly and everything to do with stimulating the economy. If the whole scheme was about being green, then, the government would have encouraged people to buy a second hand, small car. Or just walk…..
Buying used is best as mentioned, the carbon footprint is already washed. There are many older good, clean running cars out there for cheap. As for reliability underwrite your own warranty. new car warranties cost 10-15k in the form of depriciation, not many cars (any worth owning) need that kind of money in the first 100k of service….and I drive BMW’s!
+1
I bought my 1998 BMW 328i sedan 4 1/2 years ago for $13k with 52k miles. It gets 21 mpg in town and 33 mpg on road trips (80+ mph). Today with 95k miles it’s worth about $8k (still looks and drives like a new car). No hybrid could give me a lower per-mile cost or be as much fun to drive.
Hybrids do not save the environment — nickle is mined in Canada, shipped to Germany to be refined, shipped to China to be made into batteries (with lots of rare-earth elements) then shipped to Japan to be put in cars. A much larger overall carbon foot print than driving a diesel.
Twotone
Could this not be called old car versus new(ish) car? You’d more likely want to compare a 2003 Civic versus the 2003 Civic hybrid for this to be an apples to apples comparison.
The biggest question: does your ability to deal with discomfort (downtime for repairs, poorer performance, fewer amenities) match up to your cheapskatedness (new word). Using your beater v. hybrid comparison as a benchmark, a beater car makes little sense when you could get a beater $500 motorcycle w/ tiny trailer and use that for everything. The motorcycle would have better fuel economy, lower initial cost, less parts, etc. Sure, rain and snow on a bike is a pain in the rear, but it is cheaper on a bike.
@katieputrick:
“The new car will be more safer. A definite consideration if you’re going to be carrying your family in it.
That’s why I choose to keep my Toyota Yaris 2004…”
-A Yaris safer than any Volvo? Um, no…
However I agree with buying a good secondhand car like the Yaris as a second car. Excellent reliability, fuel efficiency, and it’s even relatively comfortable, even for a 6’4″ guy like me. To me it represents one of the best “investments”, automotively speaking. But Safer? No…
On a cash basis you are spending $650 to $800 a year more to get 5% ($200) on $4,000??
Quentin,
You must have different definition of discomfort. A 1994 rear wheel drive Volvo is supremely comfortable, while the Civic is a penalty box with wheels, IMHO. Poorer performance? You’ve got to be kidding. The 940 handles like a large Miata and rides like a dream. The only thing better in the whole world is a 240 with manual gearbox. Civic is a cheap POS in comparison.
Beater wins by a landslide. I cannot remember the last time I paid more than $3000 for a second car. Drive it 4 years, another $1000-3000 in repairs over that time and sell it for $1800. Costs me $500-1400/yr to own a nice older car. These include a 68 Chrysler Newport (one of my favorites), an 84 Olds 98 Regency (this one cost me a rebuilt THM 200 at 57K miles), an 89 Cadillac Brougham and currently a 93 Crown Vic. The Vic has been the most trouble-free after 4 yrs, but has now been demoted to teen car.
It helps that I like this kind of car. Every one of them was in a condition that I would not have been afraid to get in and drive on a 200 mile trip. We have also kept a primary car that has been either late model or new, that we drive for a long, long time.
***-A Yaris safer than any Volvo? Um, no…***
Time again to cue the classic Renault v. Volvo….
My wife and I have a 2004 Prius with 109k miles on it. If you buy new and keep the car for this long, it’s a very frugal choice. The catch is that you pay up-front, and get your money back gradually through lower expenditures for gas and maintenance. (Our Prius has a wonderfully cheap maintenance record.)
If you plan to buy a car and drive it for 3 years, though, a brand-new Prius would be a poor choice, though.
OTOH, my mother (who is more environmental than myself and my wife, but she’s retired on a fixed income) owns the original Plastic Saturn. She bought it very-used for $2500 about 7 years ago. She constantly pays for maintenance on everything from the timing chain (she heard it start to clatter and took it to the dealer — I’m proud of her and it’s an interference engine), to getting the headliner re-attached. But the mileage is pretty good — 35mpg is typical I think, but I think she beat 40mpg drafting behind a U-Haul trailer that I was towing once. She probably spends about $1500 per year on maintenance. It’s been a great car for her, and it doesn’t conflict with her ideals at all. She has tried to claim dibs on the Prius if we ever get rid of it — but she just can’t afford a new one.
So, there you have it… The environmental cheapskate drives a beater when she must drive, though you must choose the beater carefully and also be lucky. The cheap-but-not-too-cheap and environmental-but-not-too-environmental and upwardly-mobile couple drives a Prius. Both think they made the right choice.
I would like to re-iterate that not just any beater will be the cheap and environmental choice. In order to maximize this, the car must be efficient and easy to maintain. The Plastic Saturn seems to be a winner, but I bet a wagon model would be even better. A Honda Civic might be another good choice, though Honda parts can be more expensive. Also, even though I’m a DIYer, having a relationship with a trustworthy mechanic is a good idea — my expertise stops at the timing cover, and I don’t have the tools to replace ball-joints or do an alignment. My mother seems to be quite good at finding the right mechanics — but a part of it is that she really likes to be perceived as (and treated as) a nice little grey haired grandmother — which is actually a pretty accurate description of her, these days. So pick the right mechanic and the right car, and a beater can be a total win.
But, if you can afford a Prius and plan to keep it for a couple of hundred thousand miles, it’s an excellent choice, too.
BTW, you can’t claim your carbon footprint is “paid off” and then go spend $650-$800/pa extra on fuel.
That’s like “Mission Accomplished”.
Old and cheap cars are cheap for a reason. They can be both unreliable and costly to keep running. Most people are not the kind of crazed DIY type I am. Thus, running a 15+ year old Volvo as a daily driver becomes an expensive proposition which may cost you money and/or leave you with a broken car at any time of any day. For most people their car is there to enable the other things they do in life. When the car doesn’t keep its end of the bargain it is no bargain at all.
slateslate.
+1 !
Luke42 I would like to re-iterate that not just any beater will be the cheap and environmental choice. In order to maximize this, the car must be efficient and easy to maintain.
Couldn’t agree more. Saturns, the smaller the better, have been known to traveler over 100K before replacing the front brake pads. Tires last the 50K rated on them. I owned and loved a 97 Saturn SL 5 spd for four years, and though I never saw 40 mpg (27 was my average – possibly a CO thing, dunno), but I hadn’t replaced a thing other than oil changes and one alignment in 65K miles, though at that point new tires were needed. My current Saturn Astra 5 spd at 30K still has 10mm of brake pad on the fronts, 11mm in the rear and the tires are at their halfway point.
Point being, if you buy a Honda Civic as opposed to the Volvo station wagon, you will more than likely face smaller costs of ownership; i.e., the ankle-biters, tires, brakes, shocks, struts, parts, etc. This is a savings over newer technology mainly due to its wide prevelance and mechanic common knowledge. Many european beaters for example have to be maintained by certified mechanics and contain parts that are either hard to find or have to be shipped from the Old Country. Sometimes smaller, simpler is better, especially if the goal is saving money.
Using your beater v. hybrid comparison as a benchmark, a beater car makes little sense when you could get a beater $500 motorcycle w/ tiny trailer and use that for everything.
As a former motorcycle mechanic and lover of beater bikes I can tell you that if you spend $500 on a bike you should also save up for a good pair of shoes because you will be walking alot. Maybe things are different in Phoenix or California where bikes are appriciated as transportation and not just ego enhancement. Here in the midwest a bike in that price range is likely from the early eighties with between 15k and 25k miles. It would have been hauled out of the garage (if it was lucky enough to be indoors) every May or June, raced up and down the road a few times, ridden when it is between 68 and 79 degrees and sunny and then put away wet in September.
Maintenance is slack at best and motorcycles suffer abuse better than neglect, but the $500 bike will have had both. Ham-fisted modifications are also likely.
Just trying to put things in perspective. I ride alot and my bike gets 52mpg, but it is also stone reliable since I paid actual money for it.
Also– not all bikes are suitable for trailers. In fact most aren’t.
KatiePuckrik:
That’s why I choose to keep my Toyota Yaris 2004
Katie! Does this mean you’ve dropped the Jag?
–chuck
@Chuckie
No, I still have both of my beautiful babies. I’ve had the Yaris since 2004 and the Jaguar since 2007. I could never part with them.
P.S ott, Slateslate beat me to it. Modern cars are streets ahead of older ones. That’s the beauty of technology, it progesses, not regresses.
aamj50: I’m not talking about sport bikes. I was being facetious to point out the silliness of comparing a mid 90s Volvo to a mid 00s Civic hybrid. One would have to be insane to want to have a motorcycle as their only form of transport, dealing with the rain, noise, and poor drivers around them every time they get on the road. Here in WV, the weather is already getting to the point where you wake up to wet ground and 50* temps. No thanks.
I owned a motorscooter for 2 years of college. It was perfect for getting around town. The only reason I bought it was because my brother and I were sharing a car at school and we both needed separate vehicles pretty regularly. I paid $2000 for the Honda and sold it nearly 3 years later for $1300. I took a bath on the thing, but I needed some mode of transportation. When I got a job and moved from my college town, my motorscooter was useless outside of a 1 mile radius from my house due to roadspeed. Within a mile, I’d rather hop on my pedal bike. It sat for a year. I started it once a week to prevent “lot rot”. The scooter worked at college and having a 2nd car. A beater car fills the same roll for me. You better have a 2nd option if/when the beater breaks down, else things will get uncomfortable quickly.
Good thread: thoughtful, informed, advances and develops some positions well, non-inflammatory, non-dogmatic. The reason I read TTAC. Life’s too short and challenging to be righteous or contend with the righteous.
I drive my son’s 1997 Toyota Tercel (now showing 188k). Would I like a newer car? Sure I would. Do I feel like paying too much, financing a car for 60 months, losing my butt on depreciation and paying over with interest? Not on your life. When I go to look for a replacement, it’ll more than likely be a 5 year old or so vehicle that I can hopefully pay for fully in cash. Given today’s levels of reliablity, even a 5-7 year old car will get me something reliable, comfortable and economical (if I so choose). For the same money I could buy a new (pick your small car here), I can find a well-optioned, usually higher-line used car. And again, given the relative increase in reliability these days, saying you buy a new car to avoid breakdowns and such doesn’t hold much water if you stay within a five year or so build. And as comparisons go, I’d still rather find a nice gasser vs. a used hybrid. I think over a three year period, I can safely drive for less money with the gas variant over the hybrid (assuming I don’t go out and buy a used Hummer, that is). Call me a Dave Ramsey wanna-be, I suppose (which is a little hard to do when you’re a gearhead).
Beater Volvo Diesel FTW
Never breaks, 33mpg, comfy, cheap to insure, 10% WVO in the tank.
My cost per mile, including insurance, over the last 3 years: $0.08
The ‘carbon footprint’ argument is specious. You can’t buy a beater unless somebody else already bought a new car; if everybody tried to switch to used cars, an equal number of cars would be produced as is produced today (barring occasional oddities like the destruction of ‘beaters’ in C4C).
The ‘carbon footprint’ argument is specious. You can’t buy a beater unless somebody else already bought a new car; if everybody tried to switch to used cars, an equal number of cars would be produced as is produced today (barring occasional oddities like the destruction of ‘beaters’ in C4C).
This is accurate. The article is based upon a false dichotomy that ultimately results in a strawman argument.
New cars will be purchased by somebody, somewhere. For the most part, used cars will not be destroyed, but simply reallocated elsewhere in the system.
The carbon footprint will be determined by the new cars that enter the system. If the new cars are gas guzzling resource suckers, they will have a greater impact than would more efficient alternatives. The future carbon footprint will be determined by the new cars that we buy between now and then, offset by the old cars that are eliminated.
The question raised in the thread is only relevant if the new car alternative includes scrapping the beater. Since that isn’t generally the case, it doesn’t mean much.
Nice one Steve – this is exactly one of the points I have been trying to make about Hybrids since they first started humming their way out of showrooms in large numbers.
I have personally owned the best part of 12 ‘beaters’ (or ‘bangers’ as they are known in the UK) and a majority of them cost me less than $400, I spent no money on parts, and most of them did me 10,000 – 20,000 miles before being pushed into the junkyard.
And then to top it off if you strip off useful parts and sell them on ebay/craigslist, combined with the actual scrap weight of the vehicle, driving a ‘beater’ can be as close to zero cost driving as you can manage.
If kept up, that 940 would probably still sell for about 2000 in eight years.
Depreciation expense for the eight year period will favor the Volvo by about $400 a year ($650 vs. $250).
As somehow who doesn’t have to do with the IRS, can someone explain that?
How can you depreciate a $2,500 beater by $650/year over eight years, when the depreciation is $2,000.
Also, another flaw in this comparison; the price of fuel used. With global economic recovery, car use in China and India increasing at an unsustainable rate, I’d be placing bets on $5-$6/gallon inside the next 5 years.
vvk :
October 1st, 2009 at 10:45 am
Poorer performance? You’ve got to be kidding. The 940 handles like a large Miata and rides like a dream. The only thing better in the whole world is a 240 with manual gearbox. Civic is a cheap POS in comparison.
A thousand SCCA members must be slapping their heads in disbelief over this… Civic? The new one is as big as a 1994 Accord… and it handles pretty darn well. Plus, it gets higher crash ratings than a 940.
A 1994 Civic, on the other hand, is a tinny piece of will run rings around anything else with four wheels on an autocross, thanks to a full double-wishbone set-up and a curb weight close to zero.
A Miata would beat it, though… But a “Miata” that weighs nearly twice as much? No.
slateslate :
October 1st, 2009 at 10:48 am
***-A Yaris safer than any Volvo? Um, no…***
Time again to cue the classic Renault v. Volvo….
And to think I was saving my ’92 740 wagon for my kid to drive in a couple of years…yikes!
slateslate :
October 1st, 2009 at 10:48 am
***-A Yaris safer than any Volvo? Um, no…***
Time again to cue the classic Renault v. Volvo….
Considering this video gets posted in virtually every internet thread pertaining to car safety, older cars, or Volvos, it amazes me that there are still people who haven’t seen it.
Everybody’s seen Minivan Vs. Land Rover too, right? Don’t want to see any more embarassing comments.
I really wish people would use critical thinking skills when evaluating vehicles for safety, instead of the usual: size, weight, butch image, and what the commercial told them (I’m looking at you, Volvo).
“A very well kept Volvo 940 with low miles will fetch about $2000 to $2500 retail.”
Those are very tough to find at that price. Especially a wagon.
—
I agree with Steve’s basic premise but:
1) PCH101 is right (somebody must buy new cars to keep the beaters coming) and future fuel demand depends heavily on choices the new car purchaser makes. It would take the Mother Of All C4Cs to purge the past Decade Of Wretched Excess from the system. There’s still a lot of big vehicles on the road.
2) I like the economics of a beater but we take long driving trips. For this we keep a late model car, usually one we bought new. I don’t like surprises en route when I must be 1200 miles away in two days.
niky,
Speaking of autocross, back in mid-90s there was a guy in my H-stock class driving an old 240 automatic. He would not come to all events but every time he did all of us had a hell of a time trying to beat him. He usually finished first. Beating a 5-speed Acura Integra, among others.
I have driven many Civics. The early ones with double-wishbones were very competent handlers, however they were no match to the *REAR* wheel drive Volvos. Their torque-less econo-motors were very poorly suited for auto-x, too, since you need low-rpm torque more than rev-ability. More recent Civics are competent cars but, again, typical front wheel drivers when it comes to 10/10 handling traits. No match to solid rear wheel drive dynamics and tractor-like torque of a classic Volvo, IMHO.
Errh… it’s the man, not the machine? A few forum-mates who autocross their Proteges usually come in within the top ten at their events… last one only came second to a Corvette. And that’s a mixed field of cars.
Although, yes, I agree with you… low rpm torque is much more important on an autocross than high top end power.
I’d put my 15 year old Caprice up against a new(ish) Prius anyday of the week. I pay a little more for gas (24 MPG HWY), but less for insurance, and on the rare occasions something does break, parts are cheap and plentiful. It rides better, is larger, is safer, is roomier, more comfortable, and when I get done with it at 150K miles will be worth the same $2k I paid for it when it had 66K miles. Carbon footprints be damned.
How can you depreciate a $2,500 beater by $650/year over eight years, when the depreciation is $2,000.”
I assumed depreciation of $2000 for the Volvo (based on $2500 purchase price)
The other calculation was in error. It should be $500 * 8 which equals $4000 in depreciation.
But then again, the Civic may be worth closer to $1500 by that time if either the battery or tranny are about to go.
Either way, a beater is far cheaper to own than a hybrid in the long run due to all the factors I mentioned.