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MrKatharsis posted:Down with prison chat, up with car chat. Saw this while browsing AI: some poor guy buys a 9 year old V12 Benz for more than half his annual salary, and records its hilarious litany of problems: I dunno, for all the huge red warning signs, it seems to have worked out very well for him.
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Sep 13, 2014 14:21
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spog posted:I dunno, for all the huge red warning signs, it seems to have worked out very well for him. You think he would post 'had to drop 3k into it for this reason and then another 4k for this other reason then the brakes went and it's rusting out a lot' ?? He was going to buy the car, everyone else in the thread be damned. He had 10 people say run and he went ahead and bought it anyway. Of course he put on a happy face.
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Sep 13, 2014 16:20
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That car is more of his hobby, he is an enthusiast who does all his own work. Good financial sense? Not at all, but if he had bought the car and paid to have the work done versus doing it himself very methodically he would have spent literally tens of thousands of dollars more than he did. Someone in the 2nd thread says that he has spent over $50,000 in repairs in 60,000 miles on his. That's a fantastic series of threads by the way and a good read for anyone interested in cars if only for how hilariously complicated that one is and how great a job the guy does. God drat that car was such a massive piece of poo poo when he bought it. Here's the follow up thread detailing the work done http://mbworld.org/forums/s-class-w220/431985-ongoing-maintenance-repair-2003-s600.html quote:I do think I may made a pretty bad financial decision. heated game moment fucked around with this message at 16:40 on Sep 13, 2014 |
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Sep 13, 2014 16:31
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Something about his sperging, methodical attitude about that car and his broken English has me mesmerized.
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Sep 13, 2014 18:51
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Cyrezar posted:That car is more of his hobby, he is an enthusiast who does all his own work. Good financial sense? Not at all, but if he had bought the car and paid to have the work done versus doing it himself very methodically he would have spent literally tens of thousands of dollars more than he did. Someone in the 2nd thread says that he has spent over $50,000 in repairs in 60,000 miles on his. OOOH. I only read the first thread and thought it had run for 2 years without any work required on it. The second thread is a different beast altogether.
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Sep 13, 2014 18:57
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Same co-worker that was having problems with Sprint is all pissed off this morning because the power company shut off his power because he didn't pay enough on his last couple bills 
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Sep 15, 2014 14:17
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100 HOGS AGREE posted:Same co-worker that was having problems with Sprint is all pissed off this morning because the power company shut off his power because he didn't pay enough on his last couple bills Anger is a secondary reaction. Perhaps he is pissed because some small part of him realized he is in fact retarded? Speaking of Sprint, anybody see that deal where they have unlimited talk+text and 20gb data for $100 a month, and will buy out your current contract to switch? The amount I pay to Verizon for a lot less data is an entry in this thread. It is being bad with money.
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Sep 15, 2014 16:54
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NancyPants posted:Anger is a secondary reaction. Perhaps he is pissed because some small part of him realized he is in fact retarded? At least where I live, paying more for Verizon data isn't that bad of a deal because, unlike Sprint, it works reliably and at a high speed. But I don't have a smart phone so whatever.
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Sep 15, 2014 17:01
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Yeah Verizon prices sucks but at least I get reliable service. $60/month for 500 texts and 2 gigs of data is dumb as all hell. Like I'm going to actually work while I'm at work.
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Sep 15, 2014 17:17
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NancyPants posted:Anger is a secondary reaction. Perhaps he is pissed because some small part of him realized he is in fact retarded? Sprints constantly in the process of upgrading their towers, so I would check the coverage in your area before making any changes. Similarly, that plan probably is $100 plus some kind of line access fee ($15 - $40) and they'll likely want you in device financing as well to get a discount. ATT does the same thing. You see those commercials for $160 for 4 lines? That's only if you own your devices outright - if you're on a contract you pay a $40 line fee, pay $15 per line if you own your device outright, or pay $15 plus the cost of monthly financing (usually $20 - $30 for smartphones). Cellphones are bad with money and we all pay too much for them.
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Sep 15, 2014 18:35
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Meowjesty posted:Sprints constantly in the process of upgrading their towers, so I would check the coverage in your area before making any changes. Hey now we pay $18.99/mo for my wife's cellphone (https://www.textnow.com Goon run) and my work supplies mine  .E: they're on the Sprint network I think.
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Sep 15, 2014 18:50
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I'm in an area with the upgraded towers, and the connectivity is wonderful...in certain spots. There are a lot of places where data quality drops drastically if you go indoors, or just go a few blocks in any direction. I've never had reason to use data much outside of home and work(which both have wi-fi); if I did, I'd go to another network just for that. Depending on how much you use, something like Ting would be better - same network as sprint, but you pay based on what you use instead of pay a premium for UNLIMITED. Or something that uses another network, if you care about data speed & reliability. E: Or that TextNow thing. Dang, those prices are even better than Ting's. (Unless you barely use your phone at all) Haifisch fucked around with this message at 18:59 on Sep 15, 2014 |
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Sep 15, 2014 18:55
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Meowjesty posted:Cellphones are bad with money and we all pay too much for them. Definitely not trying to start some sort of argument but having at least in America, having a cell phone, like having a car, has become kind of a necessity. For example at work we CONSTANTLY text each other as a form of communication because walkie-talkies suck in an industrial environment. It could be argued w/o one I wouldn't have a job and that would be bad with money  For the latter compare to some place like I dunno.. London, where there is good public transport, access to grocery stores and other necessities, you can live just fine without a car. Cars are inherently bad with money (gas, parts, insurance, blah). Then again everything in London is ten times more expensive so that's bad with money. I think I just confused the poo poo out of myself 
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Sep 15, 2014 18:56
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There are many cities in the US where you can get along without a car just fine...in the city. In suburbs and rural areas yeah you need a car.
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Sep 15, 2014 18:58
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Even if you live in an American city without a car how do you travel? I've never been able to figure our how you make that work. I live in the suburbs/country so I need one anyway but how would I go visit family and friends who live elsewhere?
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Sep 15, 2014 19:54
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When you can't take a bus, take a cab, rent a car, or bum a ride. Renting a car for a weekend visit is much cheaper than owning a car.
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Sep 15, 2014 19:59
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Rent one. BFC option: Greyhound
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Sep 15, 2014 19:59
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http://www.reddit.com/r/personalfinance/comments/2gfe0w/how_can_i_get_rid_of_this_car/ Reddit Personal Finance strikes again. Person was driven to a car dealership by a loving parent and left there. Rather than take a cab to their lovely job, or walk or hitch hike, they signed paperwork for a $15,000 car so they could get to work. Work was that important. Then the timing belt went on the car, loving the engine completely. Car is now worth $1500, needs $1700 worth of repairs, and still has a loan for $14,200 on it.
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Sep 15, 2014 20:03
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Ethiser posted:Even if you live in an American city without a car how do you travel? I've never been able to figure our how you make that work. I live in the suburbs/country so I need one anyway but how would I go visit family and friends who live elsewhere? Rent a car for the day/weekend/whatever. Or take a bus if you're poor.
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Sep 15, 2014 20:04
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Ethiser posted:Even if you live in an American city without a car how do you travel? I've never been able to figure our how you make that work. I live in the suburbs/country so I need one anyway but how would I go visit family and friends who live elsewhere? How elsewhere? The thing with living in the city is that most of my friends live in the city with me, so I walk, bike, bus, or Lyft/Uber most of the time. Sometimes I'll drive my own car, but depending on where my friends live its often it's much less hassle to leave it in the garage and not worry about parking/drinking/damage-from-fuckers-who-can't-park. If I'm visiting friends or family in another city, which is only a couple times a year, if it's more than a couple hours drive away I fly. In which case I take the train to the airport. I still own a car because I just like cars and it's nice to have the option/luxury, but I am not dependent on it by any means. The number of times I really need a car I could rent one for much less than the cost of ownership. Plus now cheap carshares like Car2Go are everywhere in my city and are very popular among the don't-own-a-car crowd and make that lifestyle even easier. Unlike zipcar, you can do one-way trips by the minute and just leave it at your destination, no need to return it. Guinness fucked around with this message at 20:09 on Sep 15, 2014 |
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Sep 15, 2014 20:06
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I know a lot of people that use Zipcar (usually for gorcery shopping) and swear by it.
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Sep 15, 2014 20:08
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After doing insurance for a year in every state East of the Mississippi, living in New York, Michigan, and Kentucky is bad with money.  if you want decent insurance rates.Particularly New York City. I don't see how anyone can justify living there and paying the bullshit they charge there.a
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Sep 15, 2014 20:08
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My insurance is like 800 a year in Michigan, that's not too bad. Also we don't have to get our cars inspected, you see some absolute shitboxes around here. Cars that make you nervous to see driving on the road near you.
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Sep 15, 2014 20:16
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laxbro posted:Rent a car for the day/weekend/whatever. Or take a bus if you're poor. I take the bus and I'm not poor???
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Sep 15, 2014 22:28
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Zipcar was Bad With Money when we actually worked it out. Peapod delivery is way cheaper than Zipcar, plus we gained hours of our time per week back. I've really found Zipcar more and more of a stretch to actually use. Anything longer than 2-3 hours and you can often just rent a car for the day (Zipcar includes gas, so you have to factor that in) in advance, and have it longer (if parking isn't an issue). An hour isn't long enough with a Zipcar since we need to pick it up, drive out of the city/or deeper into it, do our chore, then drop off at home & return the zipcar nearby. The minimum entry is basically $20. In a city with awful, unpredictable traffic, and living in an area where extending your reservation isn't possible, one $50 late fee (plus the anxiety it gives me!) usually cancels out any savings. Heck, it may be cheaper to UberX to a grocery store and back than Zipcar. The only time Zipcar makes sense is if Zipcar < Rental + Gas, considering you have a rental for 24h. Or you can't park (a concern at my current apartment). xie fucked around with this message at 23:10 on Sep 15, 2014 |
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Sep 15, 2014 23:07
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My insurance as a 23 year old living in Baltimore was like 2250/year. It was a 6 year old Subaru and I've never had an accident. Plan to use public transport and car rentals when I move to DC in six months. I'd rather pay a little more in rent to be walking distance to groceries and public transport. Will probably use the airport rentals when traveling outside the city since my Dad told me their prices are much more competitive than random rental services in residential parts of the city.
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Sep 15, 2014 23:46
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As far as I'm concerned, Zipcar might as well be car timeshares. And you know how well that works out typically.
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Sep 15, 2014 23:56
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I just got back to the US and will only be here through Feb, was really hoping I could avoid getting a phone (not so much for the expense, but I just hate having one). I was also starting to apply for jobs and nope, it's just not really an option to do without. For those of you who are interested, I did a fair bit of shopping around for cheap, no-contract plans: Option #1 was to join my parents, sister, and brother-in-law on a family plan (note: my parents aren't in dire straights financially, just frugal and willing to deal with the hassle of sending my brother-in-law a payment for their part of the bill every month). I could do $10/mo for unlimited voice (maybe text too? can't remember), or $30 to add 2gb of data onto that. They've been doing this for years, and if you have family you trust enough with money to sign up for a plan with, it's worth looking into to save money. Option #2, from MMM (which my sister parroted) was Republic, which uses VoIP when it can and goes to a cellular network when that's not available. I decided not to go with it because they required you to buy their phone, the cheaper one was $150 and seemed substantially worse in features than the 3 year old unlocked Galaxy S2 I brought back with me from Japan. I could have sold it at the end and recouped most of the money I spent on the phone (going by completed eBay auctions), but for $25/mo plus the hassle of a shittier phone and having to sell it when I left, it didn't seem worth it in my case. Option #3, which I went with, was a $30/mo pre-paid plan with T-Moble, which gives me 100 minutes of voice (includes both incoming and outgoing, womp womp), unlimited text, and unlimited data*. If I know I'm gonna make a longer call I can either wait until I get home to use the landline, or use a VoIP program like Viber or whatever. This is actually pretty close to the plan I had in Japan, albeit like half the cost and with unlimited texts thrown in the bargain. *first 5GB at LTE, then throttling ======= Next up: health insurance: Looked like I was stuck with $140/mo catastrophic care ($6300 deductible), since under the new ACA guidelines, your Modified Adjusted Gross Income also takes foreign earned income into account. Despite the fact I no longer had this job (or the bitchin' healthcare that came with it), I was ineligible for any subsidies (thanks, Florida) or Medicaid. I was about to cough up for it when I happened to see a link on my old college's Alumni Association page as I went on there to renew that (so I could get that sweet, sweet university library access), they partner with a company that specialises in coverage for recent grads, people between jobs, etc. I was able to get only slightly worse coverage ($7500 deductible) for a lot less ($45/mo or so after tax). I am in really good health and decided to just not ride motorcycles while I'm here.  ======= I've also got get a car (no real choice in my area, plus planning to do some substitute teaching), which I'm not looking forward to, but thems the breaks.
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Sep 16, 2014 00:06
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Boris Galerkin posted:I take the bus and I'm not poor??? I take the bus or train to work. Sometimes the guys in the office suggest I should get a car and I ask them to present a business case for having a car. It doesn't financially add up unless you have a family or your hobby.
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Sep 16, 2014 00:08
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Devian666 posted:I take the bus or train to work. Sometimes the guys in the office suggest I should get a car and I ask them to present a business case for having a car. It doesn't financially add up unless you have a family or your hobby. http://bikeportland.org/2012/06/28/with-six-kids-and-no-car-this-mom-does-it-all-by-bike-73731 You can have 6 kids (maybe more!?) without a car!
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Sep 16, 2014 00:36
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Boris Galerkin posted:I take the bus and I'm not poor??? I meant greyhound type buses for interstate travel. Probably the worst way to travel anywhere.
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Sep 16, 2014 02:12
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laxbro posted:I meant greyhound type buses for interstate travel. Probably the worst way to travel anywhere. Megabus is actually cool when you can get a good rate
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Sep 16, 2014 02:37
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EugeneJ posted:Megabus is actually cool when you can get a good rate Buses on the east coast are the prime example that bus is not the worst way to go. $15 from downtown to downtown or $150 from airport to airport... Also if you use a discount code or Priceline you can get a rental car from the airport for under $20 a day. I agree that the cost benefit from Zipcar has really gone downhill...there are only a few specific situations when I can see it being cost effective (there is a Zipcar in the basement of my office, and I can expense it directly)
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Sep 16, 2014 03:17
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laxbro posted:I meant greyhound type buses for interstate travel. Probably the worst way to travel anywhere. I've ridden Greyhound a couple dozen times and only had one stereotypically bad experience. Usually it's pretty good. Maybe that's just my route though? 
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Sep 16, 2014 05:41
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The caveat with Greyhound is if your bus arrives late to LA Union Station during the worst rainstorm in a decade and the last amtrak out of LA leaves for Orange County without you and your fellow transfers, your are stuck there with a very expensive piece of toilet paper and they could not give a gently caress less. But I digress. Highbrow Slick fucked around with this message at 06:35 on Sep 16, 2014 |
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Sep 16, 2014 06:32
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necrobobsledder posted:As far as I'm concerned, Zipcar might as well be car timeshares. And you know how well that works out typically. Except you don't permanently own the car. But other than that... no, still not really a car timeshare. That is not really a good analogy for it. Zipcar for me is pretty good at least in SF. Don't have to use a car too often and I'd rather do Zipcar than pay $150+ a month to rent a parking spot so I can drive my own car with my own insurance and pay for my own gas and go to the shop when someone decides it's funny to break my window. No thanks. I think if it's groceries or whatever (which I rarely do) it's probably easier for me to call some other service that handles that like Instacart or Postmates. Zipcar for 2.5 hours is about 23-30 dollars depending on the type of car I get and how far I want to walk. Car2Go seems nice with it's one-way service (which is apparently illegal to have in SF) but it cost 0.38/minute and doing the math it's pretty much break even because my actually roundtrip driving on Zipcar is 60+ minutes. I guess the one benefit is that I don't have to worry about rushing back. That $50 late-fee anxiety for Zipcar is definitely there... Edit: Apparently now Car2Go is $0.41/minute... but $14.99 if you pay by the hour... :| Strong Sauce fucked around with this message at 10:19 on Sep 16, 2014 |
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Sep 16, 2014 10:16
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Zipcar you are definitely paying for convenience versus a one-day rental, but I think in a lot of urban areas it makes sense.
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Sep 16, 2014 10:53
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Strong Sauce posted:Edit: Apparently now Car2Go is $0.41/minute... but $14.99 if you pay by the hour... :| At a quick glance, I can get an economy or compact car for a full day at a price of $28+tax. It's tough to see any of these hourly/minutely rentals as being very cost-effective compared to just getting a car for a whole day. KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:Zipcar you are definitely paying for convenience versus a one-day rental, but I think in a lot of urban areas it makes sense. Do they pick you up, or offer some other service that makes them better than normal auto renting? It seems to me that if you have enough poo poo to do that you need the car for 2+ hours, you may as well just rent one for a day, and not have to worry about charges adding up if you fall behind schedule. If you're just going to the store and back, a bus, or a taxi, or Uber seem more appropriate.
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Sep 16, 2014 11:46
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Centripetal Horse posted:At a quick glance, I can get an economy or compact car for a full day at a price of $28+tax. It's tough to see any of these hourly/minutely rentals as being very cost-effective compared to just getting a car for a whole day. I know for my area, I can get a car for $20 a day, but only if you book more than a week in advance; the same-day rate is closer to $40. So a by-the-hour car makes sense if you really need the flexibility, in a similar setup to owning a car (decide to drive somewhere, then go jump in a car).
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Sep 16, 2014 12:18
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Car2go works really well for me. I live about 1.5mi from a metro station, and the buses in my neighborhood are iffy (at best) I've been called a cracker and told I "dont belong on this bus" so many times But regardless, for days when I dont feel like biking, that 1.5mi drive back from the metro tends to take 10min or so, so around $5. It means I dont have an insurance payment, car payment, gas, maintenance, and if things get financially tight I'm not liable for anything. That said, I do only work in the office twice a week and get a ride from my wife in the mornings so it's an anecdote that doesnt apply to everyone - if I were using it in a more traditional commuting case the value would break down rapidly.
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