I’m not one for New Year’s resolutions. If anything is worth starting next month or next year, it’s worth starting now. Besides, I know myself well enough to know that after a few days or weeks I’m going to wonder why I even thought I’d do such-and-such in the first place.
So, this year, not so much a resolution as a goal: I will endeavor not to buy a vehicle in 2010.
In 2007, our Nissan Maxima got crashed and totaled, making it necessary to purchase another car. We decided on a 1999 BMW 323i, which turned out to be a rotten deal. I wouldn’t go so far as to say that we made a mistake purchasing it, because you can’t see the future and you don’t know what you don’t know, but it sure ended up all wrong. After two $1000+ repairs, and another impending one, in 8 months, we cut our losses in 2008 and got our 2005 Nissan Altima. It’s been great.
Then in 2009, our old 1997 Altima had enough engine wear that it was going to cost more than it was worth to fix, so we went car shopping again, settling on a 2007 Mazda6.
So, with the Mazda purchase, we are hopeful that our car buying is done for a long time. We’re hoping for 10 years. Maybe in 2019 we’ll have to start shopping for vehicles again, so, hopefully no blog posts or news articles regarding vehicle purchases till then.