“Vast swaths of our lives became consumed by auto debt, repairs...and years spent behind the wheel.”
We recognized that problem early on. I always insisted we live less than 10 miles from work and I was able to hit 4 miles for me, 10 miles for my wife. We always bought used cars with 20k to 30k on them and saved a bundle on first year depreciation. We always had four year loans and kept the cars 10-12 years, so we had many years without automobile debt payments.
With those few simple decisions, we were never slaves to the automobile.
“With those few simple decisions, we were never slaves to the automobile.”
Agree, in my case, it’s about once a DECADE where I will pay someone for a non-covered repair. The rest of the time, I fix the cars myself and I don’t buy into the crap that cars are “too complicated” to fix - 20 years ago we didn’t have YouTube, now we have resources that we only DREAMED OF then - plus, if you buy a Japanese car, most of the dreaded repairs never happen. The people making the “too complicated” claims are simply making excuses for their laziness.