Bah! What to do?? Car needs replacing... VENT

[V8]

Hey Ladies

Just after some advice or help. We just got our car serviced and it needs quite a bit of work done that will cost about $1500, that's just at the moment then if the automatic goes then that's another thousand or so. Our car is probably worth $1000, it does the job but it aint worth fixing. So we are just going to probably run it into the ground once it costs more than a few hundred to fix we will have to get rid of it and get another car. But i have noooo idea how we will afford another car, even a decent second hand car would cost us about $10-15k. Ok so we don't have much cash, but we do have a house (mortgaged), i don't really want to but we could possibly re-draw some of our equity on our home loan (have no idea what that involves) and buy either a new or second hand car. Or we just have to borrow another car (from family) till we can save up and afford a decent second hand car.

I really have no clue what to do, has anyone been in a similar situation, what did you end up doing to solve your dilemma?

Also if we do get another car i'd like to think it would be big enough if we decide to have 4 kiddies so would need to factor in that aswell.

[LilShenanigans]

Depends, how long would it take to save for another car if you borrowed one? 6 months? a year?
Thinking of that, will you specifically need a certain type of car within this time frame.. growing family that sort of thing.

If you need a certain type of car within the time frame you could save the money, I'd gamble on the re-draw and step up to get a car that would last a decent amount of time.

Otherwise, my first option would be to borrow..

[V8]

Yeah it's really hard to decide, i hate having to make such big decisions, and DH is hopeless with that stuff. He has no say in the finances anyways. So yeah it's all down to me. I guess really we would just have to see what's out there see what we need to save and borrow my parents or brothers car till we can afford to get another one. I don't like the idea of re-drawing on the home loan at all. Arrghh, so frustrating!

[TwoBoysOnly]

That happened to us and we borrowed money from my parents and paid it back to them on an interest free loan - we bought a good second hand car....since then we have got our own loan and bought a new car

[DivinelySophistimicated]

Hi v8!!!

I wouldn't re-draw off the home loan as it would raise your mortgage repayments.

Try going to a place like Pickles, Its a car auction place. You can go and buy one at its set price which is really cheap, they just have high km's. They are ex lease cars but other than that nothing else wrong.

We bought an 04 model BA Ford Futura for $11,000 and we got it financed through the Auction place. We pay 200 a month in repayments, which works out to be $50 a week which is quite affordable. Ill see if I can find one in your area if you tell me where you live lol.

Cheers xx

[perrywinkle]

I wouldn't buy a new car. The value drops dramatically once you drive out the drive way!! Definately go for a second hand car. As for a car if you intend on having 4 kids a KIA Carnival is a good one. Not sure on the cost of one though!!!

[V8]

Kirby - Cheers hun!

Perrywinkle - I also don't want to buy a new car anyways, seems second hand is the way to go these days.

I asked the mechanic when i picked up the car about Kia's he said they are shocking to repair, he had a kia sportage in and it cost $4500 to replace a belt or something.... hmmm, going to have to do some serious looking around.

[mazzie]

We had the same thing happen to us with our old EA. We bought it for $2000 and a few months later had to get all the brake disks replaced and a major service - it ended up costing us $1500!!! Then the bonnet latch broke and the battery went flat so we couldn't get it open. The gearbox was stuffed as well so we sold it to a friend for... $200!!!!!

My mum lent me $2000 and I bought a Laser Ghia, it has lasted us 2yrs now without any problems and is still going strong. We bought it from a family who had had it for years and always serviced it and were upgrading in size. Its probably only worth $1500 now but it has been a great car.

If I were you I would probably try and find a cheap second hand car on ebay or in the trader, new cars just aren't worth the money!! They depreciate so much!! At least with an older car they stay the same value.

A VN or something similiar would be good and you would be looking around the 2 1/2 - k mark.

**Having said that I cant wait until I can afford to buy a decent car (and I will buy it outright - not on a loan) I want a Mazda6!**

[InSaneOne]

we currently have a kia carnival and to be honest we haven't spent all that much on it and it is 7 years old. We have had it for 21/2 years and it is going great. before that we had a kia shuma - and spent hardly anything on that too. when the battery died and we called racq the older guy that came with the new trainee said he hardly sees the kias but i see them all the time when i am driving around. the parts do take a little longer to get in as most places don't always have them in stock but they are about the same price as other cars parts.

for cheap but good cars - try the car cave at the end of the magic mile at marooka. we got our 2003 magna from them in almost new condition and it only cost us 10k - really cheap.

[jordy&steph'smumma]

Same thing happening here. Our 2nd car is going to die one day so dh just bought a VS commodore for $1000 (It has light hail damage) and we will use this for our main car.
The auctions are the way to go if you know your cars etc.
Our last car was also from the auctions ED fairmont which was also $1000 and has lasted us 4 years.
Just an option but if you have a friend who knows a bit about cars auctions are all the way to go or ebay where some people buy them from the auctions then sell them on ebay.

It's worked for us.

Kylie

[V8]

A VN or something similiar would be good and you would be looking around the 2 1/2 - k mark.

**Having said that I cant wait until I can afford to buy a decent car (and I will buy it outright - not on a loan) I want a Mazda6!**

We currently own a VN commodore wagon, it's alright but yeah starting to go, it's nearly done 300,000km. We bought it for $3000 but that was including new tyres and mags and some work done to it. I wanna hold onto it a bit longer. Oh and i agree Mazda 6 are tops!

Thanks B&B and J&Smum - Dad owns a tyre franchise so he's keeping his ear to the ground for me, but he has found a guy that goes to auctions and buys on your behalf you pay him like $500 and he can buy you a car with his dealers licence, reckons we could get a commodore with only 30-40,000km on it for $10-15k, total bargain!! So yeah this is affordable for us and hopefully this car will get us through at least till the end of the year with minimal maintenance.

[mwong]

i borrowed money from the family and paid them off a modest family interest....got a decent second hand car...

[BlessedWithBlue]

Oh gosh please don't buy a Kia, we have a Carnival and have had nothing but problems with it. It has a horrible turning circle too.
We just had the powersteering done a few months back which cost us nearly 1k and now it needs a new transmission which is looking like it's gonna cost us close to $1500.
We are thinking about getting rid of it and getting something better very soon.

ITA with Kirby about pickles! they are great except we buy the damaged vehicles cause fil is a panelbeater and spraypainter dh and him fix them up and re sell them.





I asked the mechanic when i picked up the car about Kia's he said they are shocking to repair, he had a kia sportage in and it cost $4500 to replace a belt or something.... hmmm, going to have to do some serious looking around.

[FluffyBunny]

Oh gosh please don't buy a Kia, we have a Carnival and have had nothing but problems with it. It has a horrible turning circle too.
We just had the powersteering done a few months back which cost us nearly 1k and now it needs a new transmission which is looking like it's gonna cost us close to $1500.
We are thinking about getting rid of it and getting something better very soon.

When we were looking at a people mover to buy I nearly bought a Kia Carnival!
We were dead set on buying it from a private buyer and then I decided to jump online and found a website and forums where the majority of people said not to buy one because of the troubles and how expensive it is to fix.
We settled on a Hyundai Trajet 7 seater and it is excellent!
Another friend of ours had a Kia car and shes had nothing but troubles. It cost her $15,000 when she bought it and a year later she went to sell it because she had enough of all the repairs it had to have done on it while she had it. It got valued at $5000.

[jpm3]

i have a ford territory 7 seater-love it! only thing is if the back seats are up there isn't alot of room for a big pram.. bought it second hand, they are a bit expensive but it will last me a long time. we had the money saved and traded our car in.

[V8]

Thanks for the info with the Kia's, i really have heard too many bad stories to get one of them. There seems to be a few more different 'people movers' on the market now so will be able to get something good eventually.

[BlessedWithBlue]

Funny you should mention the Trajet cause that was our first choice! the one we test drove we absolutely loved!!! only problem was we were just a tad bit too late as the car yard sold it the very next day :( i couldn't for the life of me find any others through a dealer or private, we had heard that the Kia's had a bad turning circle but didn't know that they were expensive when it comes to parts etc otherwise we would have never have bought it.


When we were looking at a people mover to buy I nearly bought a Kia Carnival!
We were dead set on buying it from a private buyer and then I decided to jump online and found a website and forums where the majority of people said not to buy one because of the troubles and how expensive it is to fix.
We settled on a Hyundai Trajet 7 seater and it is excellent!
Another friend of ours had a Kia car and shes had nothing but troubles. It cost her $15,000 when she bought it and a year later she went to sell it because she had enough of all the repairs it had to have done on it while she had it. It got valued at $5000.