I made it unclear, but I’m not talking about myself. I’m speaking in the voice of people who talk shit about manuals. My past three cars have been manuals.

The first-gen X5 was shockingly sporty. The second was sporty too, though the competition was heating up. By this latest gen (2015-2018), the car has become barely sportier than a Mercedes. So yes, an X5 can absolutely be sporty.

Everybody laughs at people who “fix up” their land barge X5. This is coming from a guy whose wife drives a 2017 X5. I saw one just like my wife’s with an M Performance decal on the rocker panels. I couldn’t help but laugh at this attempt to make a baby-carrier into a “performance” vehicle. 

Dude, no one cares about long distance pogo jumping. People are really into drifting. If you’re not into it, that’s cool. But other people are.

Sorry, I didn’t mean me. I meant that’s what you hear from a lot of people. 

But the automatic can shift 0.1 seconds faster! My 0-60 time will be 0.2 seconds faster! The manual is dead and old technology!

While I agree that it’d be nice to diversify coverage of motorsports, the reason it’s on here a lot is because it’s something a lot of young people are interested in. It’s also more accessible to more people since it doesn’t require very large tracks and anyone with a 240sx or G35 can do it.

Interesting that ZF makes what is probably the best overall longitudinal automatic transmission on the market (8HP) and also makes the transverse orientation 9HP which is so lackluster.

Here is the rankings list:

This is all anecdotal evidence. Does she have data to correlate the total volume of cars sold to the number of claims coming in for each car? If she also handled claims for Ferrari she might think they’re the most reliable car in the world based on the number of claims she gets for them.

But it’s not like they give infotainment equal ranking. You know that right? It’s a much smaller part of the scoring than the drivetrain. Also, virtually all manufacturers have issues with infotainment. It’s not like one manufacturer was dragged down only because of the infotainment.

These days vital car functions can be tied to infotainment. Also, CR does assign a point value to things. If a car is more likely to have a failed engine, it will be ranked more unreliable than a car that is more likely to have a failed bluetooth connection.

Wait, but you own a Fiesta. Doesn’t that mean your car is perfect in every way. It’s simultaneously the sportiest, most fun to drive, most reliable, and most luxurious car on the market right now, right?

For a car that’s maybe just below the halfway point, that’s true. However, when you have to reliably get to work every day, having to deal with an unreliable car can mean the difference between having a job and not having a job. 

That’s very rare. Name a car that does that.

Nothing like a long-term loan post to get the Jalops on their soap boxes.

My motto is, if you have enough money to pay the car off, take whatever loan term you want if it’s near 0% interest. Harder to get those, though, since interest rates are going up. Generally if savings rates are going up, then loan rates would go up as well.

The only extended warranty I’ve ever purchased was a Chrysler Maxcare for my Grand Cherokee Overland with air suspension. For the service loaners and peace of mind it was worth it. The cool thing is I sold it after 4 years and got a prorata refund of the warranty. Pretty cool.

Let’s say you making $100k/year with more in savings and are buying a $25k car at 96 months/0%. That’s a very smart financial decision. You can choose to pay it off early if you want. Paying a $100 payment six years from now is cheaper than paying $100 now assuming inflation is steady. Also, even if you save your…

50 year mortgages? jesus. A 30 year old buying into that might realistically never have a chance to even pay off their home.