i have a couple of friends who are stupidly addicted to their falling apart 20 year old cars, but they seem to take perverse pride in dropping $5K for a new transmission or other major repair every other year, and going on about how much they are saving buy not buying a new car...

i have one buddy with a 2004 VW and he's spend like 20K on it in the past 4-5 years and like goes on about how new cars are all debt traps and he'll never have a loan again... and i'm over here looking at a '23 Integra that's like 25K... and won't need any major repairs for 15+ years...