I Just Got a $1,250 Car Repair Bill. Here's Why I'm Not Too Upset

Maintaining an older car is often cheaper than buying a new one.

Car repair bills are one of those unavoidable parts of owning a car. Even if you're an incredibly lucky driver and never get into an accident of any kind while driving (or even have another driver hit your parked car), car ownership isn't free. You'll be on the hook for routine maintenance and repairs like oil changes, tire rotation, new batteries, and so on. No one is happy to get a phone call from the mechanic telling you your car needs an expensive repair, but that was the situation I recently found myself in.

I drive a 2009 model year car that I bought new back at the start of my last career, about a year after I finished graduate school. It's seen me through a lot, including multiple long-distance moves and epic road trips as far west as the Southern California coast and as far east as Prince Edward Island, Canada. When I was working on site (rather than from home, as I do now), it also took me to and from work every day. These days, I use it to run errands and buy groceries, and it's still an awesome road trip vehicle (excellent highway gas mileage and comfortable to drive).

I recently noticed the car was making a clunking sound when I made turns, so I popped over to my mechanic to see if they could take a look. I got the phone call not long after my walk home from the shop: I needed some repairs to the back end, including new coil springs and shocks, plus a wheel alignment. The total? $1,250. While this certainly wasn't happy news, I actually feel pretty okay about it. Here's why.

It's less expensive to drive an old car

While I openly acknowledge my biggest financial mistakes, keeping a car for more than 13 years is definitely not one of them. I got the car with a 60-month auto loan, and I made every single one of those payments on time and in full, and was thrilled to make the final one in 2014. Car payments are expensive; as of July 2022, the average monthly payment on a new car hit $733. And while insuring a car can also be pretty pricey, keeping insurance on a paid-off car is often cheaper.

Since I definitely don't want to have to replace my car, I will happily pay to maintain it. Broken coil springs are just one of those things you might encounter if you drive an older car (especially if you live in a place that gets serious winter weather like I do -- road salt isn't car-friendly).

I made my new credit card's sign-up bonus

I recently got a new credit card I'm excited about, and it came with a sign-up bonus. I had six months to spend a chunk of money on the card, and I'd get 10% of that money back as a statement credit. A large purchase can be a good way to make that minimum spend if you know you have one coming up. I didn't when I got the card, but I wasn't worried, as I deliberately chose a credit card that pays cash back in a major spending category for me and I expect to get a lot of use out of it.

As it turned out, I made the sign-up bonus minimum spend in just two months, thanks to putting this car repair on the credit card. But, for the first time in my life, I won't be carrying that big charge forward and paying interest on it.

I have money in savings to cover the bill

I got out of debt in 2022, and since I finished my debt payoff a few months earlier than expected, I've been able to save up a chunk of money. Some of that will cover the taxes I owe as a freelancer, and some of it forms the fund I'm saving up to buy a house. But I have flexibility to dip into it for issues like this repair bill, and indeed, intend to always have an emergency fund going forward. So while I may have handed over my credit card at the mechanic shop, I then turned around and paid off that charge with money I had saved.

While a $1,250 car repair isn't ever really good news (unless you were expecting a much higher tab at the mechanic), I'm not all that upset about it. It's just part of life. Getting my finances into shape in 2022 left me in a position of being able to cover the bill, and that feels really good. That said, my savings account and I will both be happier if it's a while before we have to handle another surprise expense such as this one!