In December of 2005 my 1989 Toyota Camry blew a head gasket on my way from Logan to Ogden. It broke down at the famous "Break Down Burger King" in Wellsville. (I coined the name after said car broke down there and then many cars of friends and family also broke down at the same spot.) The Camry was dead! Because the oil and antifreeze mixed the engine was ruined and we ended up selling the car form $30 to the pick a part. It was a very sad day.
Kyle and I ended up buying this 1998 Toyota Camry with about 70,000 miles on it. I drove this car everywhere! When I was working for Up to Three I was putting 3,000 miles on the car about every 6 weeks. I did that job for 5 years. The car took us to San Diego in 2009 and has made a few trips from Idaho to Utah. We have done nothing special to the car. Just regular maintenance. We loved this car!
At Christmas time we rented a car to go to Utah because we were too afraid to take the Camry. We just didn't want to chance it with kids. In April the car hit 249,000 miles. Yes! We put 179,000 miles on this car in 8 years! The car was dripping oil like crazy. It needed new shocks and struts (if you hit a speed bump you would bottom out). The car also needed a few other minor repairs. It hadn't broken down yet, but it was getting to the point where we didn't want to drop any more money into it.
We discussed keeping it until it broke down. We talked about trading it in. We weren't sure what to do. We looked at some new cars, but the thought of having a car payment just hurt. We toyed with the idea of a new car, but decided we needed something bigger. We test drove a mini van. We liked it and almost bought it, but then we found this:
It was 200 miles away and so we almost didn't buy it. I called the dealership and negotiated over the phone. I told them I had two young kids and I wasn't driving 200 miles (400 miles round trip) for a car I might not like or not get a good price on. I told him what we would pay. He said yes. I put some money down to hold it. Then we jumped in the car and drove to get our new Honda Pilot.
When we got to the dealership they said it was a good thing we put money down because 3 people had test drove it before we did and 1 person had come back to buy it. He was mad because it was "sold" another person saw the Pilot on the internet and when he went to look at it the Pilot was "sold."
We test drove it and loved it.
We got back from the test drive and signed the papers. We traded our Camry in right there. The salesman almost died when he saw how many miles it had. We just laughed.
We love our new car. It has a back row and so it can seat 8. We are hoping this car lasts to 249,000 miles too!
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