Our van… is doing weird things.
We’ve had it since 2009 and it was a few years old when we got it. Now it is randomly stalling or not starting. This, as you can guess, does not make it as the Barenaked Ladies say, “a nice reliant automobile.”
Worst part is, it is one of those problems that mystifies the mechanics, too. So today we had to consider some options.
- Pay the mechanic to “go fish” until it’s fixed (made more difficult by the fact that they can’t replicate the problem)
- Pay the mechanic for their time and bring the van home and park it. Go car-free for a while.
- Pay the mechanic for their time and bring the van home then drag it to a dealership to trade it in on another used car. Problem is, we can’t really afford a decent, reliable, lemon-lite vehicle right at the moment so we would have to settle for a potential junker or get into a loan situation. Ugh.
We didn’t want the “go fish” option so the van came home. What do we do next? Not sure… but we’ll be pondering options and definitely not driving it unless it’s unavoidable. We will also be cleaning it out and detailing the heck out of it in preparation for potential trade-in.
In the short term, we will be borrowing a friend’s car while they are away for the next few days. Last time we were this screwed, a friend sold us a junk car for a buck — that bought us a year as we saved our pennies.
Frankly, I’m all for trying car-free for a while. I already pay for a bus-pass for work. We can have a few tickets on hand and otherwise walk — there are three grocery stores within a reasonable walk, ditto banks, restaurants, and drug stores. It means we are stuck in the city limits for the most part — no roadtrips for a while — but we aren’t trapped by any stretch.
Of course, we are also going to push for sales and check under the sofa cushions for spare coins… wish us luck…
UPDATE 15 July: The van has been behaving — whether under threat of replacement or whether the investigative work the mechanics did actually addressed the issue — so replacement isn’t urgent. But, it knows that it’s job is on the line….