In August 2001, in the wake of a large sale of books from my publishing company to Walmart, I bought Gabi her first new car: the Toyota Echo. I was 38, she was 33. She’d never had a new car before; none of her friends had ever had a new car before. It was delivered in front of our house on Redesdale with 11 total miles on it. Gabi was ecstatic.
A functional, urban car with good gas mileage and excellent reputation for service and reliability. Three years later and pregnant with our second child Camilla, I bought Gabi a Ford Freestar Minivan. I inherited the Echo as my car.
I’m not a car guy. I don’t think my manhood is tied up with the vehicle that I drive, though it took me a long time to get here. I’ve owned a Mitsubishi Eclipse, two sporty BMW motorcycles and a 3 series BMW coupe. All of these vehicles got me from point A to point B just fine. Except for the motorcycles, none of them made me happy in any direct way. And all of them cost too much, which is OK when I’m making good money, but very much not so when I’m on the other side of the spectrum.
Why get a fancy car? Who are you trying to impress? I’m certainly not trying to impress girls anymore, and motorcycles were always better for that anyway. And look at this from the other direction – name me one person you look up to because of the car they drive.
I’ll wait.
I love the Toyota. It’s the cheapest car to drive I have ever owned. No repair bills in eight years, steady 35 mpg, tires are cheap (not like my brother’s Mini Cooper) and it gets me around OK. It’s a bit short on fancy electronics like a GPS or sound system, but my iPhone covers both of those just fine. I gave up my last physical office in 2002 (it was a nice one on Wilshire Blvd. in Los Angeles), so I don’t have a daily commute. The Toyota can sit for a week or more and not see any use. We put 5,000 to 6,000 miles on it a year now.
Assuming that I can get 200,000 miles off of it, I did some basic math. We’re at 61,000 miles now. We’ll hit 200,000 miles in 23 and a half years. I’ll be just turning 70 then. I can’t imagine a better deal on a car.