What are your thoughts about spending $1200 on repairs to a 1994 Jeep Cherokee with 158000 miles?

From my experience, $1200 isn’t that much. I would say that if you think it’s going to give you a few more years, do the repairs. You definitely won’t find a quality used vehicle for that price.

Yeah, that’s maybe the way to look at it: you’re buying a fixed up 1994 Jeep Cherokee for $1200. That’s a pretty decent deal.

No way. that vehicle has a history of mechanical problems. its $1,200 today and $3,000 dollars tomorrow. buy a Honda or Toyota with those miles and you will be driving breakdown free for many more miles.

I expect to get one more year out of it, probably not two. Northeast winters and salt are pretty rough on the body. It’s starting to rust out in a few places, if that info helps.

What’s Bluebook on the car? That’s one good place to start.

@dpworkin I think the blue book stops at 7 years unless they changed it with cars lasting longer. This one is 17.

Maybe it’s time to use the money to put something down on a less problematic short.

more than the car is worth :P

ok so wheel bearing, not a big deal that, brake work again that’s totally to be expected even on a newish car, u-joint its 4 wheel drive so from all the years you’ve had it this parts gonna have taken a hell of a beating…

I would pay and keep it on the road, if the chassis is still in good shape and you don’t need any welding from rot or real bad rust your motors gonna be on the road for many years to come, most of that moneys coming from labour costs also those belts have done to have lasted this long anyway…

Also these days you can more or less ignor the mileage that engine will be the last thing to go if looked after and not thrashed…you ever seen UK top gear when they went to the US and bought $1000 cars, you won’t get much of a motor for that!

oh forgot to mention, had my timing belts done on my old Fiat, its just a lot of man hours getting to the bloody things, cost me £400 and that was at my local garage where there always knocking a few quid off our family’s vehicle work. That’s about half your total and the other half is pretty normal to pay out for a years motoring maintenance on a car that goes through some harsh weather, rain, cold, etc

How thorough an inspection are we talking about? Here in IL, all they would do is sniff your tailpipe, less if your car were OBDII. If you’re looking to get a few more miles out of your old boat, patch up the muffler and get it behind you. If we’re looking at something more thorough, it’s probably time to put your buggy out to pasture.

http://www.edmunds.com/jeep/cherokee/1994/index.html

Looks like your ride sells for about the same money you’re looking to put into it. My advice is to see what you can get for it at a local Carmax, or donate it to charity for a tax deduction.

wow 17mpg getting 63mpg’s outta my 1.4TDi defiantly the future :P

Personally, I would rather fork over $1200 once or twice a year to keep an older vehicle in good working order than spend multiple hundreds of dollars every month for the next 4 to 6 years to cover a car payment.

@YoBob I agree at least then you know the history, you probably know what’s gonna crop up and what’s not, when I was younger I went though a stage of buying really terrible cars that lasted months at a time and cost me peanuts…good side not tax or MOT (UK) to pay down side is its stupidly un-reliable and you have to keep sourcing more crap cars lol…good fun though ;)

@Tobotron We are supposed to get some sort of Polo in the States this year.

@dpworkin your telling me the VW Polo is only just coming out in the states?! maybe its the bluemotion model that does about 60mpg on a 1.4…even my parents VW Toureg 2.5ltr twin turbo manages 37mpg i dunno how you guys can afford to run these guzzlers?! cheaper fuel prices than us?

new polo is very nice though, great performance and looks pretty mean for a small car, very quick off the mark in the sportier models, the GTi would embarrass alot of larger cars!

This will be our first Polo ever. We never got the Derby, either.

@dpworkin Derby that must be what we call the Golf? probably all to do with some US car giants getting in trouble and not offering more fuel efficient alternatives, German motors are engineering wise the best on earth…

my favorite VW the Scirocco http://fc08.deviantart.net/fs31/f/2008/231/b/5/Volkswagen_Scirocco_GTI_by_degraafm.jpg

been out about a year, bet this would sell like hot cakes in the US!?

@Tobotron
Yep, VW refrained from selling many of their small models in the US because americans preferred their big fat SUVs and pickup trucks, so they never saw it profitable to try, especially since all their models would have had to be expensively retested and certified for safety and emissions for the US market. Not to mention that Europe’s most fuel efficient cars are all diesel powered, and diesel has a bad reputation in the states and is also more expensive than petrol.
And yes, petrol is much cheaper in the US, which is why fuel efficiency never took off with their domestic carmakers.

@Tobotron: I don’t agree with you when you said “you probably know the history and you probably know what’s going to crop up and what’s not.” There are any number of things that can crop up unexpectedly, as you probably know.

i was going to suggest www.edmunds.com but @IchtheosaurusRex beat me to it. i would take the $$ and put it toward a new car, that way, you know you have this set amount every month but there’s a warranty in case anything breaks (which is not likely to be major anyway since car is new). i had an older car that i inherited and it was $800 here, $800 there, new tires, still had some issues, and i could not wait to get rid of it while it still ran ok. if someone is a good mechanic themselves and can save by not having to pay a garage to do the repairs, it’s great, but otherwise, i look at it like you’re putting good money after bad. i think sometimes people keep older cars because they feel nostalgic toward the car, or they feel like buying a new one is too big of a step, but it’s nice having a new car, reliable, dependable, paying a set amount each month instead of a mystery what may break down or not.

@jca I guess it boils down to what you can afford, maybe if you put it all down on a speadsheet or on paper and looked at what gave you the value your looking for against the + and -‘s of a new and old car…

motoring is only gonna get more expensive, I know in the US using fuel is considered an investment, your investing fuel in getting from A to B not what we think of as wasting it (unless you need to drive of course) my American friend who used to live in London couldn’t believe people walked everywhere and didn’t just jump in the car lol

but im off topic ild say if your going for a new car at least consider the medium term future and don’t spend outside what’s value for money…even thorwing away that SUV for a modern BMW hatch would save you a fortune on fuel and look a hell of a lot nicer!

@Tobotron: true – plus a new car may be better on mileage than an old one with old filters and newer cars are probably more lightweight than the old ones.

@jca
”newer cars are probably more lightweight than the old ones”
Not really. Newer cars have a lot more equipment than older ones. The Mk.V Golf GTI for example weighs twice as much as the Mk.1

@ragingloli the Mk1 is also still the faster of the lot in a straight line, but mpg’s its not even close…

ild buy a car 2 yrs old, lost most of its depreciation probably a few thousand on the clock, basically new but without the price tag :)

@ragingloli: i was referring to old clunkers like old cadillacs where everything is metal, evven little things like glove boxes, doors are really heavy, etc. new cars – everything is plastic inside. new cars do definitely get better mileage (at least they have the capacity to). i am wondering, just for comparison’s sake, how a new jeep would do mileage-wise against his 94 jeep. maybe worse, but i know i have an 08 Civic and the mileage is better than what i would have had 20 years ago.

My father used to say $1200 is about 3 car payments. if the repairs keep it running another 3 months then you are golden. I have a ‘93 Sonoma that refuses to die. Will probably keep her another year or so.

@majorrich: the person faced with the dilemma has to consider (if $1200 is about 3 car payments like you suggested) is would he want to pay $1200 toward an old clunker or $1200 toward a brand new, reliable, beautiful, efficient car? if the repairs keep it running another three months, and then something else breaks, you’re paying more money toward a vehicle that’s not worth that much. at that point you (or he, the asker) could not even sell it to get any money until putting more toward the repairs, unless it’s sold “as is” which would net about $500 or something ridiculously low, but the seller would not care, because at that point the car would just be taking up space in his driveway.

They way I see it, if you save the $1200 on repairs, and you had $1200 to spend, you could put $2500 down on a $10,000 Honda Civic that would serve you well for 5 years.

or even if you don’t have much $$ you could put it down on a Nissan Versa which is a pretty low priced new car.

My assumption was that was all it needs and would last a year or more with the 1200 in repairs. I just hate going into debt. I certainly do respect the new (or new to me) option if I were to suspect something else is about to die. I would hope the mechanic would tell me if something looked weak and that it isn’t worth putting any more into the ol beast.

Get a new jeep! I had a 97 grand cherokee that died at about 200,000. I would have had to buy an entirely new engine.
Now I’ve got an ‘05 liberty. It drives like a dream, and only 35,000 miles. (I bought it used at only 11,000. amazing deal)

At this point I’m leaning toward scrapping the old girl. She’s been great and I really like the 4WD, but the brakes have about 60000 miles on them, so they’re questionable. If I put the 1200 in and nothing else goes wrong for 12 months it was a good call. If I put the 1200 in and something goes next month, lousy call.

@ragingloli , a lot of popular European and East Asian cars are not sold in the U.S. because they don’t meet the more stringent crash test requirements we have here. That’s a damn shame, because some of those little cars are a hoot to drive and they get phenomenal mileage.

You might ask the mechanic to look the rest of the car over and see about weak stuff. It might be worth the extra 100 or so.

mechanic could take a look, tell you all’s well and still there’s no guarantee. old cars have countless things that can go wrong, belts, brakes, gaskets, front end, tranny – the list goes on and on. out with the old, in with the new!!