Maintaining a car isn’t cheap, but the price of repairs for some of today’s accessories could blow you (and your budget) away.
Example? Navigation screens that also contain your radio, climate controls, trip computer, etc. Say you hit the brakes one day, your kid’s baseball bat flies forward and …… SMASH!
“…you might say to yourself ‘okay I’m not going to fix it, I can do without the radio’, but the problem is it controls many other systems, so you go to get it fixed and maybe when the car was new it was a $2-thousand dollar option. To replace it might be 5 or 6 thousand dollars, and now you’re in trouble.”
-Terry Jackson, Bankrate.com Automotive Columnist
And that’s just one of many examples.
“…let’s say sensors in the bumper that monitor parking, there’s even some cars now that have radar cruise control and if you crash the front end of the car, where these sensors are, they are going to be horrifically expensive to replace.”
-Terry Jackson, Bankrate.com Automotive Columnist
Of course, if you can afford to buy a car like a $65,000 Corvette or the $80,000 Audi A8 (the kinds of cars with special sensors and radar cruise control), these high expenses may not bust your budget. But pity the poor person who buys these cars USED, then something high-tech goes haywire!
“…The replacement value, the repair value could exceed the value of the car, especially in the eyes of your insurance company.”
-Terry Jackson, Bankrate.com Automotive Columnist
Bottom line? While navigation is nice and sonar sensors sound sexy, today’s technology may be a ticking time-bomb, especially if you buy your cars used. So do some research, and avoid totaling your family’s finances.
Thanks to the faltering economy and high gas prices, banks and auto makers have lost billions because gas-guzzling SUVs, trucks and luxury cars aren’t selling for even close to their residual values. But their problem is your opportunity.
Used car pricing websites like Edmunds and Kelly Blue Book are supposed to take the same factors into account when determining the value of your used car. So why don’t they arrive at the same number for identical cars? When we compared prices for a 2004 Land Rover at five different websites (Edmunds, Kelly Blue Book, Cars
If you’re in the market for a new car, one of your first decisions will be whether to buy or lease. Which is the better option? Money reporter Stacy Johnson shows you the math and helps you decide in today’s edition of his special series, The Bottom Line.
If you plan on flying this holiday season, you’re probably ready for steep ticket prices, delays and long lines. But something else you better be prepared for is a high price if you change your travel dates. Money reporter Stacy Johnson has the story.
GasBank.com, a new start up expected to launch within the next few months, is promising to let customers buy as many gallons of gas as they want, at today’s price, and pump it into their car whenever they like. How does it work? The idea is to pool the money of multiple members and hedge
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