What's the lamest excuse for buying a crappy car you've ever heard?

[Drew Dowdell]

For me it was the story from years ago that a highschool friend's dad told as to why he bought an AMC Alliance.

Apparently he had a bad habit of (once) locking his keys in the car. So the next car he bought (the AMC) had to be one that you could not lock from the inside and could only be locked by using the key in the door from the outside. The Alliance was the only car he found that did that, so that is what he bought. The family also had an AMC Concord hatch.

They finally wised up and traded both for Impalas.

[Robert Hall]

'It was the geekiest car I could find'. - A buddy of mine (who is a long time software engineer/hardcore UNIX guy) when he bought his 1st gen Prius over 10 years ago. He now has a 3rd gen one.

[Sixty8panther]

'It was the geekiest car I could find'. - A buddy of mine (who is a long time software engineer/hardcore UNIX guy) when he bought his 1st gen Prius over 10 years ago. He now has a 3rd gen one.

i long for the days when "nerds" drove turbo diesel Mercedes Benz wagons, BMW 3-series sedans & the REAL

nut-job with a pocket protector would have a Volvo or maybe SAAB 900 "5-door"

[Robert Hall]

'It was the geekiest car I could find'. - A buddy of mine (who is a long time software engineer/hardcore UNIX guy) when he bought his 1st gen Prius over 10 years ago. He now has a 3rd gen one.

i long for the days when "nerds" drove turbo diesel Mercedes Benz wagons, BMW 3-series sedans & the REAL

nut-job with a pocket protector would have a Volvo or maybe SAAB 900 "5-door"

Heh-heh..

Two of the Prius early adoptor's buddies who I also worked with together at three companies are also some of the most hardcore techies I've had they pleasure of working with (they were mentors to me when I was a young code monkey fresh out of grad school) and are car geeks also---one has 6 vintage GTOs, a '96 Cutlass convertible, an '06 GTO, and an '09 G8 GXP...the other has 3 '70s Porsches (914, '76 911, '78 930 Turbo), a VW Eurovan (which replaced his white '89 Suburban when it eventually died), and recently bought a 1996 911 Carrera 4.

[Sixty8panther]

Ewww.... VW Eurovans are so damn lame.

How /why someone with the ability to buy a '76 & '96 Porsche 911 would ever bother with some lame-duck 914, never mind a $h!pile like a Eurovan is beyond me.

Talk about poor safety ratings! The Eurovan suck so bad the Chinese carbon-copy is probably SAFER!

[Robert Hall]

Ewww.... VW Eurovans are so damn lame.

He and his family had gone camping w/ the 'burban and a pop-up trailer, the Eurovan has a pop up roof, a self-contained camper. Last time I talked to him, he was looking at getting a small motorhome and a 4x4 pickup.

How /why someone with the ability to buy a '76 & '96 Porsche 911 would ever bother with some lame-duck 914, never mind a $h!pile like a Eurovan is beyond me.

Talk about poor safety ratings! The Eurovan suck so bad the Chinese carbon-copy is probably SAFER!

The 914 was his first Porsche, bought it used in grad school in the 80s, kept it all these years..in really good shape. (Used to be owned by a Brady Bunch cast member also, apparently).

Edited August 15, 2011 by Cubical-aka-Moltar

[Robert Hall]

On the original theme, my Dad used the excuse he needed a tow car for the family motorhomes (like a dinghy) to buy a '77 Vega, then later an '81 Chevette Scooter (most depressing, stripped down car I've ever ridden in), and later an '84 Escort diesel (which was decent and the car I learned to drive in).

[Croc]

Where's reg with his Aztek purchase story?

[z28luvr01]

The best excuse I ever heard was when my friend and I went to look at a '95 Taurus for $500 that he was going to use as a beater to keep the miles off his Monte. We get there and the fuse box is literally ripped out from underneath the dash and wires were hanging out everywhere. The owner was trying (and failing) to diagnose the reason for the brake lights not working. His best effort to try to convince my friend to buy it: "Just buy the fu*king car!" I don't think I have to tell you that he didn't buy it.

[Turbojett]

my brother, for buying a car that doesn't run, and needs a ton of bodywork.--"But I can fix it up, easy."

before you give me the "project cars are fun" lecture (I know all about project cars!), I must inform you that my brother is in fact notorious for taking things apart to "fix" them, and never getting them put back together. that car is still cluttering up an offsite garage two years later; he hasn't done a thing to it.

[regfootball]

Where's reg with his Aztek purchase story?

haha lol

the reason for that was near minivan space at 16 grand instead of 25 grand...........rebates and GM card too

[Cory Wolfe]

My ticking time-bomb Grand Am... "Oh, it runs good other than the tick" -My Dad.