So I'm thinking about downsizing again. I keep seeing the money that goes out each month for the Power Wagon and ask myself why. It's costing me about $1200 a month just to own and operate it 1000 miles per month (including payment, insurance, gas, maintenance, etc). I can't give up a truck and I can't give up a good family vehicle. The truck is not a good family traveling vehicle and the Jeep obviously isn't a truck. Keep in mind that I also have a company car that's 100% free to operate. Sure it's a 2010 Impala that has 0 cool factor, but it works and I'm sure my company will roll out some new vehicles before too terribly long.
So crunched some numbers this morning. I'm actually in pretty good shape trade in wise on both vehicles. I'd lose some money on the truck but I could easily make up for it with a partial part out. I'd have to leave the wheels and tires on it but I would strip all the expensive Carli goodies and go back to stock. There's also a lot of other little items that would be worth a few bucks like the on-board air, lighting, headers, stereo, bed cover, tuner, throttle body, etc.
So what would fill the gap from both vehicles? A 1500 diesel. I built fully loaded Laramie, Longhorn and Limited 4wd trucks with the 3.0L diesel and air suspension and they are all in the $56-58k range and I would expect to see about $8-10k off that price. This fills the need for a family vehicle and a truck, and to be honest, the truck actually works better for us for traveling because I have a ton more cargo space with a bed cover. The rough ride and 10 mpg kills it though. So what am I losing? Basically a $1200 per month toy. Sure it's fun as hell to go play around, but I do have a nice ATV that also fills that gap.
What I also lose, and quite possibly the final nail in the coffin, is when I'm in the truck my wife is more or less vehicle-less. She really isn't supposed to drive my company car and quite frankly she wouldn't want to. This wouldn't happen very often, but it would happen. So, as I read all of this again, I realize that it's not really feasible. There's just no way around having a spare vehicle unless my company vehicle was a truck. What I could do is trade the PW in on a less expensive 1500 and still save a few hundred dollars per month, but is that really worth it? To be completely honest, I'm kind of over the whole 2500 thing.
One of these would be a great replacement...
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