Nothing lasts forever. It’s a cruel part of life but your favorite pet, your beloved car, and the love of your life are not eternal. Sometimes, saying goodbye is not easy and you’re left digging through memories and thoughts. You never know how attached you’ll get to a few thousand pounds of metal, plastic, rubber, and glass. Then, you’ll sell a beloved car and you’ll feel weird about it. How hard was it to say goodbye to a car you loved?
Over the weekend I said goodbye to a car I considered to be one of the best used car purchases I’ve ever made. Back in 2021 when I worked at the old site, I bought a 2005 Volkswagen Touareg VR6. I was inspired by David Tracy’s adventures in the Lexus LX 470 that he owned for a sliver of time, and wanted to replicate the same experience on a fraction of the budget.
The Touareg I bought was full of problems, from crash damage to bald tires, a cracked windshield, and rust, but the bones were good.
The seller told me the vehicle “hesitated” at 50 mph, but the real issue wasn’t hard to figure out. Sometimes it shifted into 3rd gear with a hard slam. Diagnosis and research later revealed a bad transmission valve body, a common issue with early model-year Touaregs. The part alone would have cost me about half of what I paid for the SUV, so I decided to ignore it. Instead, I put on some new tires, fixed what crash damage I could, and then hit the road. I expected this broken Volkswagen SUV, a model already known for its unreliability, to let me down.
Amazingly, the Touareg then defied my expectations by driving nearly 20,000 miles. I drove it across the country to pick up my Honda Beat outside of Seattle. I then drove it the other way across the country to pick up a Suzuki Every at port in Baltimore. Then, I drove as far north as I could get into the Upper Peninsula of Michigan to pick up my U-Haul CT13 project. The Touareg, which I named Sophia, later took on three Gambler 500 endurance rallies, rescued broken-down cars, towed motorcycles, and did all of the sorts of fleet work I was no longer willing to subject my Smarts to.
To be clear, the Touareg was objectively a crapbox. All four shocks were well past their expiration date. Even small bumps caused so much bouncing that my tools would get airtime. The only way to drive my Touareg was with a light foot because moderate to heavy acceleration caused violent shifting behavior. I couldn’t lock the doors because the security system was wonky. The transmission pan rusted out. The headliner began to fail, water got in through rust holes, and the unibody had a crumple from whatever happened in the past. There were so many problems with this Touareg that anyone else might have scrapped it, but I worked around its quirks and kept it on the road.
During my ownership, new issues cropped up. The power steering eventually became heavy. I never finished the diagnosis, but the remaining culprits were each as expensive as a new transmission valve body. Then I took the SUV off-roading with David Tracy in Michigan, where the SUV developed a power steering leak and a weak linkage. The fuel tank also sprang a leak, another known Touareg issue.
Recently, I started looking into fixing all of this stuff. Just the parts alone would have been able to buy me a decent Touareg V8. Why would I spend more than that to keep a base model, crashed, and rust bucket Touareg roadworthy? I made the hard decision to say goodbye to Sophia. Last night I sold her for $1,000. The sale was swift, with someone scooping it up only 2 hours after I posted it. Maybe I should have raised the price…
I don’t know why it was so hard seeing the Touareg drive away. It’s just a broken German SUV. Maybe it’s because I make a lot of my decisions based on emotion and memories. That SUV was beaten, but never wanted to quit. It drove across the country and back, then asked for more adventures. It towed through the Rockies, survived Washington D.C. traffic, and trials by Gambler 500. But, I fought my feelings and sent it to a new home. Godspeed, Sophia.
How about you? Are there any cars that made you tear up after you sold them? How hard is it to say goodbye to a car?
I don’t miss the Camrys, Taurus, Highlander, or Silverado. They served their purpose.
The 500 Abarth, I miss and don’t. It was a huge pain in terms of reliability, but the character paved over a lot of flaws. My SO definitely misses it.
I definitely miss the Elise, and the Mazdaspeed 6. I’ll probably miss the Volt, even though it spent 6 months in the shop waiting on a replacement BECM.
Weirdly, I don’t think I’ll miss the Vantage.
Acura RL sedan…woof, what a car! Reliable, powerful V6, incredible grip with the SH-AWD, excellent steering/brakes, and a very comfortable, well-apointed interior. You’d be awash in confidence when driving in extremis, when a less-capable ride would make your knuckles turn bright white. Really hated to sell it, but times/needs change. Would love to have another one day, if the tech/GPS could get refreshed.
Fiat 500c Abarth (manual) – My wife always wanted a Fiat 500 because she thought they were cute. I thought they looked interesting, but as a taller man thinking of how I would like it comfort-wise and how we would manage driving up the 15-20% grade to our apt in SF… I was skeptical.
I was wrong… I absolutely fell in love with that car. And something that shocked me, it actually is an excellent car for tall drivers! Comfortable on road trips too! It was also very reliable in our hands.
2004 Chevy Astro AWD (converted to camp inside of) – I lifted it, put 30-31″ tires on it, rear sway bar, and some other stuff. It was honestly probably the best vehicle I’ve ever owned, and my wife absolutely fell in love with it as well. We sold it because the value of it had doubled (literally, bought it for $4500, used it, sold it for $9k).
My wife and I both regret selling it, but when I listed it on CL we had 30 (!) offers over night. Two people wanted to FLY to SF to see it and buy it….
We sold it to a guy who did fly to SF to buy it, and I asked him, why? He said it’s the only one that he’s found that was in this kind of condition (zero rust), with all the mods already done to it. He then drove it to Central America to live in and start a surf camp…
He sent me picks a couple years later randomly, and sure enough, it was in Nicaragua, parked on a beach, living it’s best life.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fIU9HZtVIP8
74 Super Beetle – Nope…rustbucket
62 Bug – Maybe a little, tho after two engines, a winter in Montana and a summer in Vegas, I was happy for heating/cooling…and reliability.
86 Subaru GL Wagon – Loved this car…the tears came when a high school kid T-boned me. I bought it out from insurance & drove it for another 6 mos before happily being rid of it (one loses patience after the door stops shutting on the first, second, or third try).
1987 Nissan Stanza – Great car, but it didn’t stir the soul
1996 Pontiac Sunfire – married into this one. Only tears when it left were tears of joy.
1995 Mitsubishi Eclipse GS-T – Definitely tears – I was really sad to trade this one in. My first ‘new(ish) car, and my first modern sports(ish) car. If it had AWD, I probably would have kept it.
1998 Suzuki Grand Vitara – Good car, and a nice upgrade for a small family (plus the dogs fit in it). Loved the 4WD, but wasn’t bummed to trade it after the rear main seal failed with less than 60k miles.
1975 Porsche 914 – Sad to see it go, but it was the wrong car at the wrong time. Bad compression on cyl 3 in the (free) replacement engine didn’t help. Seeing prices now, the tears are flowing.
1987 Nissan Sentra – Grandma’s car. Baby blue, no stereo, 3 speed auto. Tears of joy.
1988 Audi 5000 Turbo – loved it, but then the trans failed. Glad to see it go.
1989 Mazda Miata – Maybe some tears. Our first kid was on the way and we were moving to Utah; I (sadly) took this one for the team.
1991 Nissan Sentra – Grandma’s car pt. 2 – white, crappy stereo, and 4 speeds…with a transmission failure in the middle of moving out of state. Happy tears.
2000 Isuzu Trooper – Good truck, if ponderous and underpowered. Taught me the importance of factory vs. 3rd party warranty (diagnosed with ring failure & a week later the warranty company went bankrupt)
1998 Nissan Pathfinder – Never loved it, but it never let me down. Definition of Meh.
2001 Saab 9-5t wagon – Tears. Put over 100k on this (after buying it with ~40k). CPO warranty covered a blown turbo, otherwise flawless.
1998 Volvo XC – Definitely into this car, but it didn’t love me back. Driveshaft and drive-by-wire failed. Glad to be rid of it.
2006 Saab 9-7x 5.3 – Never mix and match tires on a neolithic age AWD vehicle. And OG air suspension sucks. Happy tears.
2011 Nissan Juke – Loved this car until the CVT started failing. And I realized that I was getting 17mpg from a 1.6l turbo engine.
2011 Acura MDX – Tears. Space, luxury(ish), AWD…We put over 100k miles on this, then gave it to our daughter.
Of the current fleet, I’ll cry if/when I get rid of my 1996 Del Sol VTEC (Mom’s car before she passed; fun to drive convertible) and my 2015 Ram 1500 Laramie Limited (bought with 30,000 miles, currently at 145k and going strong…luxury features, great stereo, and it can do truck stuff). Probably won’t cry whenever my wife decides to unload her Infiniti QX30 – nice enough, but so noisy/creaky for a near luxury car – a cheap Infiniti (Mercedes) is still cheap.
Mine was a blue ‘88 Mustang GT with a T-Top. That thing was a beauty but at that time in my life I needed something more functional and swapped it for Chevy 1500. Every now and then I see a similar one driving around but they’re never quite as nice as what I had.
Two of them, but one of them was never really mine so, it hurts but not so much…
The first was an ’88 MR2, Deep Sapphire Blue. No, not the Supercharger, but boy it was fun. Tops leaked a bit, muffler seemed to be a bad design for the car–kept blowing out, but otherwise it was a blast to drive. One girl I dated said “it felt like riding in a space ship”. I moved to NYC and it kept getting broken into despite my best efforts. I had to let it go. I regret it to this day. Since then I’ve almost always owned cars that color. I have a 2016 Mazda 6 Grand Touring that color which I also love and I won’t let go. It’s not “amazing”, but it drives like a Mazda and has all the bells, so I appreciate it.
The second was a complicated story but I was in a church group and we hauled a guy around that was a quadriplegic. He was a super nice guy, used to be a gymnast and a horse trainer, but he got his injury by a truck that crossed left of center when he was on a mountain pass while on a motorcycle. Anyhow, I was in college and one of the leaders who had a bit of extra money tasked me to go buy a van that we could use to take this guy on both road trips and the occasional camp out with our college group. So I managed to find a 92 (I think, not sure of the exact year) Vanagon–air cooled, with the poptop and weekender package. It was in excellent shape and was perfect for this use–could pull the middle seat, put tons of stuff in it, had room for someone to sleep while this guy took the lower bed but it also kept his heavy chair stowed. The idea was that I would eventually buy it from the leader who had bought it. Well, again, I moved, so when the time came to do that, I was not in the position to take it, so I had to tell him I couldn’t and he just put it on the market. Those were special memories for me though both the vehicle and the reason. The quadriplegic guy passed about ten years later while having a surgery to try to help him improve his situation. Unfortunately, surgeries were always necessary but always had some risk…very tough. It was sad to hear of his passing.
It’s been many years but I’m finally in the position to basically buy a car that is special (but not exotic) and be able to keep it, so that’s in my plans in the next year or two.
Well, the hardest one I had to say goodbye to would have been my 1989 Mazda B2200. But it died in an accident, I wasn’t ready to part with it.
The closest was my 2007 Honda Accord V6 Hybrid. It needed a repair that was going to cost roughly 150% the value the car would have had when done. Oddly, not the hybrid battery, but the magic motor mounts that particular car had. Basically sold it to be parted out.
Had a Volvo XC60 that was declared totaled after a hit. When I saw it, it looked wrecked but not awful, but I was like, Ok, I guess. Well, when I was going over the settlement, I noticed a bunch of options missing, so I made sure they were in there. The settlement agent said if they’d known that they would’ve repaired it. Part of me wished they had. It’s hard to say–sometimes a repaired vehicle is never the same. But I had another car that was damaged far worse than I thought and after repair it was flawless for years so, who knows?
1962 VW Panel bus. My first classic car. Wedding get away car. Honeymoon conveyance. Drove it coast to coast. LOTS of memories. Great car. I moved to a the mountains above Denver having never really seen snow before, and rightly decided it was not the best car in which to learn to drive on icy canyon roads. The 4Runner that replaced it ended up on its roof just a few months later (I was not the driver, and no one was hurt), so it was the right choice. Still. One of the few out of many, many I’d like to have back.
I was moving on from my 2013 335 awd with manual and a mild tune. The car was immaculate, trouble free, comfortable, fun, and generally beloved and was in the family for about 6 years. The guy I sold it to was having some trouble getting insurance as we were at the DMV and was a spirited test driver…
I got the title in the mail a few days after our transaction, it was kind of him to trust me on that. I met him later in the week to hand over the title and the wheels already had curb rash on them. It broke my heart thinking about what kind of future this car was going to have.
The only personal car I’ve let go of was my ’97 Ford Econoline-150 conversion van.
It was just getting too much to maintain, and a prospective $900 parts + labor to replace a 3-year-old catalytic converter was the final nail in the coffin for a vehicle that was already averaging well over a car payment per month just in repairs.
Selling that meant the death of my (already pretty dead by that point, admittedly) DJ business and no more band gigs with my friends, and vacations and day trips would be far less exciting in whatever would follow.
I’m still looking for high-roof conversions (old one was low-roof, no TV) passively, but very hesitantly since I don’t know how much use I could truly get out of one. Still, if I get one as a second vehicle rather than a daily, hopefully it’ll do much better.
My 128i 6-speed which was unceremoniously punted into the next life by a inattentive grandma in a highlander making left turns wherever, and whenever she damn well pleased.
Still my favorite car that I ever owned. And also the one with the shortest tenure.
ouch.
None of them. I grew up around a family automotive business. Dad must have had more than a hundred personal cars. Seeing cars come and go is just normal to me.
VW Sportwagon TDI. Great mileage, great hauling capacity, fun to drive. My wife was having her mid-life crisis and announced she wanted a sports car. I said “we have a sports car.” It was then we realized we had different definitions of “sports car.” Mine was handling and performance. Her’s was looks. Sold it and got her a 2014 BMW 428i X. I’ll admit the Bimmer is still lots of fun to drive on our local mountain roads, but I miss the combo of utility and performance the Sportwagon provided.
The hardest one would be my 1971 Alfa Romeo 1750A Berlina. It was my first car and passed down from my father to my mother then to my brother and finally me. I was very much aware how rare this car was (only 249 or 251 produced in 1971) and the first Alfa Romeo model with automatic gearbox.
I had so much fun driving the car and looking after it. However, on one rainy evening, the idiot stopped in the middle of the intersection, blocking my way, for absolutely no reason. Due to the ongoing construction, there was no room on either side of the street for evading the idiot. I had no alternative but to aim for the weakest part of his pick-up truck to crash into. While the damage to the front end was somewhat significant (mostly cosmetic), my father wanted to get rid of it and refused to allow me to use the insurance money, which was a pittance, to fix up the front end.
I kept the car for more than a decade in hope I would earn enough money to fix the front end and restore the car. However, the financial circumstances beyond my control forced me to give up this car in 2000. I’ve regretted it ever since.
Had I held onto it to this day, the car would have commanded the significant value for being the “sole survivor”. Many Alfisti could not locate another 1750A Berlina to this day. Not even Alfa Romeo has one in its storage or museum.
’97 Civic in October; two weeks shy of the 12 years I owned it. It was the car that developed my love of Hondas and got me to purchase 2 more civics & an accord. $1,100 was a deal according to the buyer but it leaked a bunch, had peeling paint, bubbling tint, 270,000 miles, wore out timing belt and a transmission that hated 2nd when you floored it.
The cash helped with closing costs of this new ranch where the cherry bomb metro, civic twins, suby brat, weird datsun, et al now reside.
However, the car I was saddened to see go the most wasn’t the Integra, VW bus, or the Astro van. It was my first metro. 13 years that shit box got me through the wildest part of my life and kept me (mostly) from digging out change for the fare box. Just had no where to keep it in the end. $75 was offered but only 50 was exchanged because I was pulling parts off when the truck arrived. Couldn’t look back as it was towed out to the junk yard in the sky where 5w30 runs free and gas is still a buck.
Out of all there are two. A 1995 GMC Safari van and a 1957 Fiat Multipla.