Buying the right car with a nice shape, robustness, reliability, economy, handling, specifications that make you happy, and driving power sufficiently apt to make your dreams come alive is a tall order. Clearly, even if you could find the perfect car, it’ll probably be super expensive and way out of your budget.
There are moments in your life, when if you like me, a young or middle-aged aspiring adult climbing the ladder to success; have the urge to own a stylish breed of muscle car, or flash sports car, or whatever tickles your fancy, then you will do whatever it takes to get it.
There are plenty of car options out there which might be your dream car, but if you stretch yourself to get one; will it be the answer to your long-term success? Perhaps you think it will be, as chipping away by ticking the boxes on your way up certainly offers encouragement to keep climbing the ladder.
However, purchasing an expensive car might seem like a great investment, but from my experience a new car will lose as much as 20% of its value in the first year. It can then depreciate maybe 15% more per year until the four-or five-year mark.
I used to love cars. It was a status symbol. Better car, higher up the ladder. It concerned me in the way others looked at me. I wanted to be accepted and admired by others. It also made me feel that I was reaching my objective at that time.
As a mature adult I now see things differently. A flash car costs an arm and a leg to maintain in good working order, as maintenance of the car can be expensive. Also, with depreciating car values such an investment often doesn’t make sense, eventually becoming a bit of a headache.
An example is when I owned a Jaguar XJS which was a fabulous car, but once a year when I took it in for its yearly service it would cost £2,500.00 (R$15.000,00). One year over £4,400.00 (R$26.400,00) as I needed to replace the high-end rear original tyres that cost around £950 (R$5.700,00) each.
You might say, ‘well spend less and get an aftermarket tire from a cheaper store.’ However, back in those days working on a busy schedule it wasn’t worth it. When my Jag was at the dealers being serviced and I got the call, it made sense to have the recommended tyres fitted immediately saving me time and effort.
If you are in business for yourself, spending a lot of money instead of reinvesting into the expansion of the business might be a bad decision. At the end of the day, it’s your choice.
Take care!
Prof. Carl Boniface
Vocabulary builder:
A tall order (expression) = an unreasonable or difficult demand. "They thought that the deadline was a tall order."
Budget (n) = financial plan, financial statement, finances, funds, resources, (adj) cheap, economical, reasonable, low-priced, modest, (ant) expensive
Breed (n) = type, kind, variety, class, sort, (v) raise, rear, farm, produce
Whatever tickles your fancy (idiom) = if something takes/tickles your fancy, you like it and want to have it: “I looked in a lot of clothes shops but nothing really tickled my fancy.”
Chipping away (phrasal verb) = although chipping away at something means to break it down, to keep breaking small pieces off something it can also mean to reduce the burden or chip away at a goal by doing things to get closer to an objective. “With so much to do to reach the target, he worked overnight by chipping away one task at a time.”
A bit of a headache (idiom) = a phrase we are all familiar with, that is routinely used to refer to a problem or annoyance and its obvious why.
Cost an arm and a leg (idiom) =
If you say that something costs an arm and a leg, you mean that it is very expensive. [informal] “A week at a health farm can cost an arm and a leg.”
High-end (adj) = denoting the most expensive of a range of products. "high-end computers"