Gut check re: car repair for 2004 Subaru

[Anonymous]

OP here. Thanks, this has been quite helpful. We're going to do the needed repairs now, make a deferred/regular maintenance plan to hopefully get another 3-5 years out of the car, and likely get a rental for our longer road trips moving forward.

And probably cancel our collision insurance - I hadn't realized how quick the KBB value on this car drops after the 10-12 year mark, but it makes perfect sense.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How hands off have the maintenance been? Did you at least change oil regularly?

What's the nature of the repairs?

There are plenty of new cars you can buy that'll get you 2-3 years of use for 2-3k of depreciation. I generally do not find used cars to be good financial decisions if the buyer can afford new - generally.

Only if they can pay cash. Otherwise you need to factor in the cost of the car loan. Plus of course insurance on a new car will be a lot more than insurance on a 14 year old car.

Car loans have very low interest rates, often subsidized by the manufacturer, for example 1.9% APR. I am not convinced that new cars cost more to insure:

https://www.erieinsurance.com/blog/insuring-old-cars

I guess you could drop full coverage to save money, so whatever floats your boat.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The cheapest car you can buy is the one you already own.

At 100K miles, all Subarus need a full suite of repairs. That will run you $2-3K. This is normal maintenance and should have been budgeted by you. The car owners' manual lists out all the repairs you should anticipate at various mileage thresholds.

I'd make the repairs. That car will easily get 200K miles, if you follow the maintenance schedule in your owners' manual.

Tell that to the owner of an out-of-warranty Range Rover.

Np: I have a 2005 LR3 with ~170k miles (first model year, bought new) and love it! For me, it’s worth it to repair (probably averages <$1,000/yr, outside of normal wear and tear items). If you love a car, I think it’s worth it to do major repairs around milestone mileage markers and the Subaru should have another 100k miles in it.

[Anonymous]

LOL, I'm the owner of the '99 Subaru and my battery just died yesterday. I went to drive to a family dinner and it was dead.

I totally jinxed myself by posting in this thread. Dammit!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would not be taking a 15 year old car on long trips with little kids. I think that you have already driven it into the ground.

I learned this one the hard way. I drove my '99 Subaru down to North Carolina and had some rear bearing issues. Had my car in a shop in rural NC for two weeks while they tried to source and ship the parts.

We go on a long road trip only twice a year. I rent a car for $100 out of DCA and run up those hard miles on the rental car. Totally worth it. And I don't have a car payment.

This is what we’ve decided to do. I posted here last year about my 2006 Hyundai w/82k miles on it because we were encountering some repairs and the car is worth squat. On our last road trip I took Metro to DCA, picked up a car, and we drove that. It made me a little wistful for a new car because features! Comfort! Shiny! So that cost us $200 for the ten days, we haven’t had any further repairs on the Hyundai this year, and we have no car payment. And we just hit 85K last week, which is pretty consistent with our sub 3k mileage per year since we moved into DC. Now hoping we can get several more years out of it.

[Anonymous]

Spark plugs are normally very easy. It's slightly more complicated one Subaru because of the flat 4 engine design, but you should not get charged for more than a half hour or hour of a mechanics time (it'll take them 20 mins tops). Spark plugs themselves cost maybe 10 apiece on the high end.

Your timing belt needs to be changed, and while they are at it most people also change the water pump. This is because it's trivially easy to do once you are already removing the timing belt. I think it's different on subarus, again because of the different engine. But my understanding is that timing belt changes are usually easier on subarus than other mass market cars.

Changing filters is trivial, but a decent test of how much a shop is trying to rip you off. It's a 5 minute job, so if they are trying to bill you for an hour or something then walk away

Fwiw I found stockman's Subaru in Tyson to be a great dealership service shop. Repair costs are pretty reasonable and I just have them do some work if I can't be bothered.

It's worth spending just 20 minutes on YouTube watching videos of what you need done. They might be simple DIY jobs, and even if you don't do them you will still get a good idea of what an honest price is. For example, one mechanic once wanted 200 to replace a broken engine mount on my Toyota. I fixed it in five minutes with a 15 buck part. I could have purchased an OEM part from a dealership for 60 or 70 and still not have had to pay for a billable hour from a mechanic to loosen literally just two bolts

[Anonymous]

Thanks again. It's a v6 so no timing belt. I have a mechanic I trust and I am pretty sure we are getting billed fairly. Water pump will probably be next on the list.

And apologies for the bad juju to the poster with the battery failure...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Spark plugs are normally very easy. It's slightly more complicated one Subaru because of the flat 4 engine design, but you should not get charged for more than a half hour or hour of a mechanics time (it'll take them 20 mins tops). Spark plugs themselves cost maybe 10 apiece on the high end.

Your timing belt needs to be changed, and while they are at it most people also change the water pump. This is because it's trivially easy to do once you are already removing the timing belt. I think it's different on subarus, again because of the different engine. But my understanding is that timing belt changes are usually easier on subarus than other mass market cars.

Changing filters is trivial, but a decent test of how much a shop is trying to rip you off. It's a 5 minute job, so if they are trying to bill you for an hour or something then walk away

Fwiw I found stockman's Subaru in Tyson to be a great dealership service shop. Repair costs are pretty reasonable and I just have them do some work if I can't be bothered.

It's worth spending just 20 minutes on YouTube watching videos of what you need done. They might be simple DIY jobs, and even if you don't do them you will still get a good idea of what an honest price is. For example, one mechanic once wanted 200 to replace a broken engine mount on my Toyota. I fixed it in five minutes with a 15 buck part. I could have purchased an OEM part from a dealership for 60 or 70 and still not have had to pay for a billable hour from a mechanic to loosen literally just two bolts

You probably don't know that the new Suburus are incredibly hard to change spark plugs on. The design almost requires lifting the whole engine out of the car to access the plugs in the bottom.

[Anonymous]

OP, I'd fix it up. Figure out how much the repairs cost, and compare that to new car payments.

I had an older van once that I replaced the transmission on, 2k. People said you're crazy-well I got five more years out of that van and sold it for $900 so my monthly cost was minimal. I then bought a smaller newer car used for cash.

Your car should last for some more years-you don't drive that many miles.