[DML] Re: depreciation

[Mike Substelny <msubstel@xxxx>]

saintern wrote:

> [SNIP] I . . . was wondering if you can indeed alsmost drive it for
> "free", buy selling it for the same price if not for more than you
> bought it for minus of course regular matience and insurance.

I don't think you can drive any car for "free," although a DeLorean may be
about as close as you can get. In today's market, even a rock solid car
with very reasonable maintenance costs (e.g. Toyota Camry) has a pretty
steep depreciation cost.

There are no guarantees with depreciation, but you can make some good
guesses. Imagine that you buy two $15,000 used cars today, an 18 year old
DeLorean and a 3 year old Camry, then drive them both for one year. The
Camry would probably depreciate by $1,500 and require $100 in maintenance,
while the DeLorean required $1,500 in maintenance but depreciated by only
$100.

Of course this doesn't account for insurance and fuel; the Camry would come
out a bit cheaper on both (much insurance information is in the DML Back
Issues). If you are a teenager, insuring any $15,000 car could cost you a
quite a bit. And remember, expect the DeLorean to occasionally be out of
commission while you perform that $1,500 in maintanance. This is a
non-dollar cost to you.

Personally, I like to consider how much the DeLorean improves my quality of
life. A year of DeLorean driving is a lot more fun than a year of Camry
driving. The way I see it, that fun is worth at least $5,000 a year to me.
So my DeLorean has already paid for itself!

- Mike Substelny