18 Jul 08 Cars & Money

Seen on a blog: Cars are a horrible indicator of wealth.

This is so true. I can remember some years ago, out driving, and seeing some luxury cars, and thinking it must be nice to be rich enough to afford that. Thing is, many of those folks aren’t making any more, or much more, that I am.

It’s just they use all more of their income to make a bigger car payment each month, so they get the luxury car.

To me, they’ve always been a box with a wheel in each corner, to get me around. Don’t get me wrong. I like to have something that looks nice, and drives nice, is reliable and comfortable. I’ve never had a love affair with cars though. I’d never buy a car for any kind of street ‘cred’ or to get one up on the neighbors.

There are one or two cars I wouldn’t mind having, because I’ve driven one, and would like to have one to drive all the time, but I’d not go and get one unless I could truly afford it. Of course, you’re pushed into that “payment mentality” if you’re not careful.

So many bigger products these days are sold by monthly payment amount, and not total price. No-one wants to tell you the price is say $15K, but by the time you’ve made all the payments in 4,5,6 years, you’ll have actually paid nearer $25K, and own a vehicle worth about $3 or 4K.

A major furniture retailer had (probably stil has) an offer to buy your furniture now, nothing to pay for five years.  Tempting? Not to me. I really don’t like the idea of having to start paying for something that’s five years old. Who knows what I’ll be doing in five years time anyway. No way jose.

The only deals I will think about are the pay in same months time, same as cash type, and make sure, that it’s paid fully within that six months too.

I refuse to be dragged down that monthly payment road myself. Of course, I do have a monthly car payment, and a mortgage, but that’s it. All those other forever-rising utility bills, not to mention the increasing amount that gets spent at the grocery store. Don’t even get me started about gas. You see, that’s the thing.

Who’d have thought say 3 years ago, that gas would be $4 a gallon? In another three years it might have gone down to $1.50 again. On the other hand it might have gone to $10 a gallon. Who knows. One thing is for certain though, you still have to make that car payment and mortgage payment regardless, so it’s good not to tie every last penny up in more of those monthly payments!

Seen on a blog: Cars are a horrible indicator of wealth. This is so true. I can remember some years ago, out driving, and seeing some luxury cars, and thinking...

Tags: 6 years, Add new tag, car payment, furniture retailer, grocery store, love affair, luxury car, luxury cars, mentality, mortgage, neighbors, six months, street cred, two cars, utility bills, wheel