Here's How You Ended Up With Your Current Daily Driver

Pretty simple in my case. Miata Is Always The Answer... unless it’s going to be your only vehicle and you need the ability to occasionally haul STUFF in your car. So the BRZ was the most Miata-esque thing I could find that didn’t seem like a COMPLETE compromise that would have me needing to rent a car every time I wanted to buy anything bigger than a bag of groceries.

Submitted by: Stand70sFastback

How I ended up with a 2023 rental spec Chrysler Voyager conversion: It was what I could afford. It’s not easy coming up with $70,000 for a $30,000 van.

Buying used conversion vans is too much of a crapshoot with the heavily modified body and frame and extra weight, it’s like buying someone else’s heavily modded project car.

Submitted by: Gin and Panic

I hang out with my local car youtuber friend a couple of times a month. When we get together he’ll throw me the keys for whatever he got latest, I drive us to brunch/lunch/wherever and give my impressions. On this particular weekend, it was their “cheapest EV you could buy” series which was a ‘22 Chevy Bolt EV in a very bland silver color.

It was “good enough” in every way that a car needed to be. Fast enough, comfortable enough, long enough range, roomy enough for 4 adults. But the best part: it’s cheap to buy (under $20K after fed/state incentives) and cheap to drive (4.4 mi/kWh or 3 cents a mile). To be perfectly honest, it’s the best cheap compact car I’ve ever driven. Every other one in recent memory compromises on one or more of these “good enough” categories.

After 8 months of ownership of the ‘22 Bolt EV — and 10K miles — we decided that we wanted the best (rather than cheapest) possible version of this car. Which is a bright blue metallic ‘23 Bolt EUV with heated seats and GM Super Cruise. I found 3 nationally, one at CarMax in North Carolina. Shipped and done.

Wife and I have 4 cars — louder, faster, more capable — and the Bolt EUV is our default. When somebody makes a better appliance car than this one, I’ll buy it. But I think that’s going to take longer than we expect.

Submitted by: jimmy-buffett

I had a baby on the way and the Mazdaspeed Miata I was driving wasn’t going to cut it. Not wanting to cave to the “you need a minivan now” crowd, I wanted a light weight hot hatch or sport sedan with 3 pedals

After owning a MK IV GTI for a while, I was pretty much set on a MKVII Golf R. It ticked all the boxes. This was 2016 when they were still fresh on showrooms. Well, the VW dealership treated it like it was a Ferrari and had everyone behind velvet ropes. There were no test drives allowed. Then, when I tried to talk price they treated me like a daydreaming kit wasting their time (I was ready to pay cash for the whole thing). Other dealerships were no better.

Since the Subaru dealership was next door, I thought I might as well try an STI. The VA was by this point 1.5 years old and there were used ones that were being offered for test drives same as any other used car without any precious treatment. Well, low and behold it felt so much better to drive than the GTI. Real hydraulic steering. A transmission that wasn’t cable actuated. 3 LSDs. And it was cheaper too.

I’ve been driving it for 8 years now. Other than poor fuel economy, I’ve had no real complaints and it’s treated me well. My next car will be a performance EV, but I’m still hoping for a non-Tesla performance sedan/hatch with a similar footprint to the STI. Perhaps Hyundai will come through with a 6N.

Submitted by: golfball

Kids, Costco runs, and a lust for wagons

I was driving a 2012 G37S sedan when my first kid was born. Despite Infiniti falling off, it was still honestly a decently fun car (i think it was the last year before they went to drive by wire). It was already presenting some space issues with a car seat in the back though, and in 2021 with a 2nd kid on the way and the first kid getting bigger (my wife and I are both tall), I decided it was time to get something a bit more suitable.

In recent years I’ve warmed up more and more to the idea of a wagon (or hatchback). I love some of the high-end options out there (RS6 Avant, E63) but they were way out of my price range. I also really love the newer V60 wagons, but even as a more realistic option, it was still more than I wanted to spend. So that essentially had me looking at used options. I spent a long time looking for used E55 AMGs, but, even though they don’t seem to have any glaring reliability issues, the upkeep of 20 year old, high end Mercedes was a little daunting. So I started shopping a much more realistic option: Buick Regal TourX.

I legitimately never thought I’d see myself behind the wheel of a Buick, but I loved the look, and after test driving one at a nearby Carmax, I thought it drove decently well too. I spent some time searching for one optioned to my liking, and pulled the trigger. Overall I’d been a great car for the 3 years I’ve owned it. I did do a tune to get rid of the auto start/stop and give it a little more pep, but otherwise have left it as is.

Submitted by: ItsDeke

Kia’s shitty dealer network.

I loved the Kia stinger from the moment I saw its debut. In 2019, my family was growing and I needed to replace my compact sedan with something a bit larger and more practical but I still wanted to keep things sporty. I decided the Kia Stinger was perfect. After doing a lot of research, I found a GT2 AWD stinger for sale for $44k at a local kia dealer. I called to confirm the price, was assured it was correct. Went in, test drove, was ready to buy, and then they brought me paperwork for $54k. Started giving me the spiel that $44k was for recent grads, kia loyalist, and on and on stacking various promotions to get to a price of $44k.

I walked.

Went to another dealer who advertised a higher price but still competitive. Ready to sign I went to the office to await paperwork. And waited. And waited. and waited. No idea where the sales guy went, but the time waiting made me realize what I liked most about the stinger was that it was a fast liftback sedan. And for the price I was about to drop, I could just afford a slightly used Tesla Model S which was not only more practical, but also way faster.

I ended up buying a 3 year old Tesla P90D with ludicrous for $54k, which was the price the kia dealership wanted me to pay for the stinger GT2. I’ve had that car now for 5 years and put 85k miles on it, and it still puts a giant grin on my face when I mash the fun peddle in ludicrous mode. Hate on Tesla and Elon all you want (I do), but they knocked it out of the park with the Model S and I’ve frankly not thought about replacing it at all.

Submitted by: Atomic

My wife and I have 2 Mazda 6's. A 2015 and a 2018. We got our first one back in 2016 because we wanted something stylish and practical with good handling. We found a 1 year old Mazda 6 with 13k miles on it for about $15k. It came time to replace our aging 2010 Ford Fusion V6 that had 220k mile on it. It was during the pandemic before the used car prices shot to the moon. We test drove EVERY mid-sized sedan in the segment, and settled on the Mazda 6 again. It was built far better than anything else, and made the equivalent Honda Accord feel cheap inside. Found a 2018 Mazda 6 Signature with only 11k miles on it for $26k. Fully loaded. Apparently it was only driven by a Mazda USA executives when they came to visit Orange County. The pandemic had cut a lot of the travel, so the dealer was getting rid of it. Fantastic deal.

The NA Mazda 6 is GREAT on fuel, and the turbo one has GOBS of torque while still returning good highway fuel economy. City driving absolutely sucks though, since the turbos spool up so early in the rev range.

Submitted by: MrMcGeein3D

I don’t have any kids, or a wife, so I can get whatever I want. Due to a couple of really bad falls and the permanent injuries I got from them, along with all the inherited back issues I have, anything like a 4x4 truck or SUV wouldn’t be a good choice at all. I went to a car in 2007, a ‘08 Charger R/T. I wanted a Challenger, but only the SRTs were available at that time, and I couldn’t make that work, so I got the Charger. I liked the way it drove, but hated the looks. In 2010, I got my ‘10 Challenger R/T in Hemi Orange. Shockingly, it was at a local dealership. The Toledo area is a “color desert” for the most part, only loaded up cars and base models seem to be in any decent color, ones I actually would want to buy are almost always black, white, silver, or grey.

In 2018, I had sold my house, moved to an apartment, and was thinking about the next car. There was no thinking about anything else, it would be another Challenger, a Scat Pack this time, and I was going to, for only the second time since ordering my first new car in 1974, getting exactly the car I want. The local dealership had a car, perfectly equipped, in the (IMHO, it’s the worst “color” ever) Destroyer Grey. A super loaded T/A in silver could have been bought super cheaply, it had been sitting on the lot for pretty close to a year. They would have to pay me enough to get the Destroyer Grey car wrapped to take it, and I don’t really like the T/A looks, so I passed. I wanted my car in Yellow Jacket, but the closest one available was over 200 miles away, so I ended up picking my TorRed SP from a Michigan dealer about 90 miles away. I never get tired of red. My dealer here did a trade for it. That was almost 6 years ago. When it was stolen back in Feb, I never expected it back, so I had negotiated a deal for a ‘23 SP, in Plum Crazy at a decent price. Equipped exactly as my car is. My car was found, with “minor damage” that turned out to be over $12,500. Two months after it was found, I got it back. No real problems, and if I wrecked it or someone managed to get past all the hassles I’ve added to the car to make it a huge pain to steal again, there would be another SP Challenger in my parking spot, and I guarantee it wouldn’t be DG, silver, F8 Green, black, or white.

Submitted by: Barry Land

I had been daily driving an ‘89 Mitsubishi Montero SWB V6 manual for close to 10 years, purchased with my tax returns on the idea that I would learn to wrench and get my license back after not having one for a long spell. I was going to get a Delica when the Montero rolled 300k miles and do an overland build, but I was also dating a lady that would soon by my Wife when that milestone approached. A Delica is not a family man’s daily, parts etc. Also, I already have something that does that already! So, the opposite of an old Japanese off roader was a German luxury performance sedan. I wanted to get a used one just out of warranty to work on myself for “Honda Civic money” which to me at the time was sub $20,000.

I shopped BMW 335is for quite a while, long enough to know to get a later model N55 engine, 2014 or later. I wanted a manual, but living in Denver I knew I would have to fly to a coast to get one in an interesting color with a manual. The pandemic hit and made traveling to buy a new daily improbable, and we rolled that 300k milestone on a Moab trip as soon as camp sites started opening again. The comprimise was a 2014 BMW 335ix GT. I realized that I would either wait forever for a 335i with a manual in an interesting color in the Denver market, or I would expand the search a bit. The GT gets a bad rap from the 5 series GT, and for good reason, WOOF. But the 3 series is basically just a Chinese market long wheelbase 3 series lifted an inch and a half with a liftback. None were offered with a manual, but I figured it was time to see if the ZF-8HP was as good as they said and I didn’t need to clutch it for my traffic commute vehicle. The day the midnight metallic blue one hit carfax I was at the dealer within an hour of their opening for a test drive and purchased on the spot having done my research. 49k miles and signs of a well kept Dadmobile on lease. I’ve done all the work on it since other than an alignment and a CV boot replacement that happened putting in the front adaptive dampers. The oil filter housing gasket wasn’t that bad. I just rolled 100k miles on the BMW this week. I tried to attach images, no luck.

Submitted by: Markoff8585

I fly a lot for work. That means I need something I can leave safely in a parking lot, without worrying that it’ll get broke into or stolen. Something beneath even the worst scumbag thief. That’s right, when I need to go to an airport, I drive there in a Mitsubishi Mirage. I’ve never had to worry since.

If I’m driving somewhere long distance, though, I take my truck. I don’t really need a truck, but it reassures clients and it is comfortable enough on a long distance run.

For fun, I have a classic Lotus Elan.

Submitted by: skeffles

Hobbies lead to my DD choice. I need something to lug my fishing kayak, mountain bike, and camping gear to places that are sometimes a ways off the beaten path. My previous daily was a 2010 Xterra. Great vehicle, but once it got past the 220k mile mark things just started going downhill. 12 years of MN winters didn’t help matter, either. Around 2021 I started searching. I knew it would be another body on frame SUV or mid sized truck. Of course, this was when Covid still had vehicle pricing all messed up. Especially for those vehicle styles..

If Nissan had still been making the Xterra, I’d probably be in one of those still. But the 2013-15 ones in good shape were hitting 20-25k+. Not a huge 4runner fan, plus Toyota Tax. Tacoma, same deal. The Colorado, specifically the ZR2 model had my interest. I test drove one but I really wanted the extended cab which no dealer had on the lot. Used ones were going for new or higher than new prices. Nursed the Xterra along while I kept my search up.

Early ‘22, started seeing the rumors on the 3rd gen Colorados. Then heard that they wouldn’t be offering the extended cab or diesel anymore. By that time the new truck market had cooled down a bit, so I headed to the dealer. Had them put an order in for a ‘22 ZR2 diesel extended cab, only options being the vinyl floor ($0 option) and block heater ($100). Never owned a diesel before, so figured I’d take the plunge on the only mid-size with a diesel option in the US. They even let me use my supplier discount, so that was nice. After a 3 month wait due to the parts shortage, I had my grubby hands on it. Did a front level, full skids and 285/70 KO2s almost right away. Just turned over 46k miles, averaging 23-25mpg depending on weather. So yeah, I’m one of those guys you see always driving his stupid truck with big tires, but it does get used.

Submitted by: Laststandard

I’ll make this brief. In 2015, my all paid for 2007 Miata got crunched by a mini-van on Interstate 26.

The missus said, “You need something bigger.”

I said, “A WRX is bigger...” This is my second one since then.

It was one of the few cars with a stick shift. At least one of the few cars with a stick shift that I wanted to drive every day.

Submitted by: owensa42

Covid and a massive fire, that’s why.

To preface: I’ve, for the last 16 years, bought a CPO lux-sports (esque) car, driven it hard for 3 years, and then traded it in for the next one. I get paid mileage to drive for work, and doing so let me get a nicer car than I’d get on a lease, drive it without worrying about per-year mileage limits (big since I was averaging 15-17k a year), and pick much more entertaining rides than leases would let me afford. This last one (M550) I bought in late 2018 with 30k on it, and if you add 3 years to that point... well, that lands us in fall of 2021, which is NOT a time to be buying a car. I could have gotten every cent I paid for it back, but I’d have had NO options for what to replace it with. Plus with the 16 months of covid - well, I was well under my normal mileage target anyway at about 55k, so I kept it. What I didn’t expect was that my driving was about to rocket to 22-24k a year as things opened back up, and I just kept driving it as there were always other things to worry about.

Namely, weather and disaster events causing skyrocketing insurance and property maintenance / fire mitigation costs, and once I blew past 110k on the M550 (averaging 4k a year in maintenance the last 2 years), I realized that my car budget had been reduced to some pocket lint and a spare yo-yo. I’d been trying so hard to keep the place and find a way to afford it I hadn’t realized we were wiping all the fun budgets just to keep the place.

So we moved - balance out the costs, get back to where we can save money again (after blowing high 5 digits trying to keep the old place), and now... well, now I’m about to buy a used Camry. Maybe a Maxima. We’ll find out tomorrow - both lower mileage, both great shape, and both low-cost, but coming from a 400+WHP Twin Turbo V8 Megasedan, dropping to a Camry... Or a Nissan, of all things.

I feel sad inside. But damn - it’s comfy, great stereo, panoramic sunroof, reliable and cheap... I’m hoping in 4 years I can scoop a used Taycan. I keep telling myself that. But yeah, I’m going from mega sedans to... a V6 Camry.

Submitted by: Lopoetve

2020 Hyundai Ioniq Electric Limited. I’ve wanted to get into an EV, and the timing and pricing was just right. There were aa bunch of these just coming off 3 year leases in next door New Jersey and Carvana had several available at low prices. Throw in the $4,000 tax credit and free charging at work, and it was a deal I couldn’t pass up. Net cost $17k for a 10k mile car that was $38k new.

Not the greatest mileage at 170 miles rated, but I basically never drive my daily outside the city. we have an ICE family hauler for that. Just need to do something about that grey faux grill.

Submitted by: Thomas Hajicek

I’ve run it down before.

Last year, I junked my Sonata after putting $2k into it within the span of two weeks. The next week, the engine blew. I did not want to put in another $2k for a rebuilt engine.

So I went car shopping. I had no down payment. Used car prices were insane, it actually made sense to buy new. I looked around for something I could afford less than $30k. Picking were slim.

I chose my Impreza because I like small wagons. It has a sun/moon roof and AWD. It took some time to get used to the CVT. I’ve only owned America and Korean econoboxes; so this is easily the nicest car I’ve ever owned

Submitted by: radioout