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I own a used 2007 Ford Escape with 94,000 miles. I love driving it but I am starting to see several major back to back repairs totaling. Over the past 12 months I've spent roughly $3,250 on repairs and maintenance and my transmission is starting to fail. My regular mechanic quoted $2,500 to repair it. The maintenance part which will have long term use includes new break pads front and back and a transmission fluid change (hoping it would solve the transmission problem). About $1,500 of the repairs is due to me having hit something in the road. The rest is just the car getting older. KBBlue is about $4,500. I paid cash for the car but I have spent most of my savings on car repairs and I don't want to put the transmission repair on a credit card.

My original plan was to keep driving it about 18 months but now I'm questioning if it's worth it. I'm waiting to find out a job change which would send me overseas and necessitate I purchase a new car. It's important that whatever I but meets the import rules. Until I know what country I would be sent to I don't know what vehicles are importable. So buying a different car isn't an option.

Alternatively, the overseas job change doesn't pan out, I will stay in DC. If I stay in DC, I plan to use the metro since both my work and home are on the metro. It would add 15 minutes to my commute but my work will pay for my commuting costs if I take the metro and I only commute 3 days/week. Plus some of the commute time on the metro can be spent reading a book or something like that. However, starting May 2019 one of the metro stops I use for commuting will be closed for 3-4 months for repairs. So I need a vehicle until around September 2019 at a minimum.

Right now I'm limping the car along, but I don't think the transmission is going to make it until the metro reopens. I'm thinking, it might be worth repairing the transmission, then selling it after the metro opens and I don't need the car to get to work. Especially since the blue book value is roughly double the repair cost.

Probably also relevant because the car is paid off I spend an average of $250 on all my car expenses excluding maintenance and repairs. I live in a very walkable, bike able and metro accessible area. So before I bought the car I spent between $100-$150/month on transportation alternatives like zipcar, car rentals, uber bike share etc.

Anyway, I feel like I have a lot of options, none of them seem good. So I thought I would see if you all could help me figure out the best option. Thanks!

Edit: For those of you suggesting I do the repairs myself, I don't have the skill, tools, or space. I live in the city and park on the street so it's not a viable option.



Submitted September 23, 2018 at 10:37PM by jone7007 https://ift.tt/2NvGZal

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