Murphy rides again...

[singinjeannie]

This is just to ask a question and complain a bit. Don't mean to sound like a complainer, but...

It seems no month goes by without some large expense, usually a car repair, to totally screw up the plan. This month is no different.

My son rolled the tractor last week, and thankfully he was fine and my DH was able to make the necessary repairs for relatively little $$$. (Thank you, Lord.) So, I think, GREAT, back to the plan...

Well, now our 2001 GMC Safari needs a (gulp) transmission!!!! How the heck does a car with 50,000 miles on it already need a transmission???? What the heck? We don't haul anything behind it, it's just our regular family car. To and from the store; to and from the bank; to and from school activities.... Geese oh man. This might be the last American made car I buy. I've owned many, many cars in my day (Hondas and Subarus) and none of them ever needed a new transmission, and I put well over 100,000 on each of them.

How the heck are we going to afford a new transmission when we're just making it????

Yes - we need this vehicle. We have 4 kids and the truck only rides 3.

Also -- any idea what a new tranny will cost us?

Thanks,
Jean.

[jmjj215]

My first question: Are you SURE you need the transmission? Have you gotten a few quotes from mechanics? I'm just hoping you're wrong!

They can run anywhere from a thousand to..quite a bit. Sheesh. Has the car been a lemon? Any type of dealer warranty or anything? W/ only 50,000 miles..you'd think there'd be something.

[singinjeannie]

The person who told us "transmission" is our trusted mechanic. He's as honest as honest can be. He even said he couldn't do the work and told us we needed to take it elsewhere. He does just about everything else, but doesn't feel qualified to re-do transmissions.

This guy is a friend of ours who charges next to nothin' for the work he does do and he's saved us thousands over the years we've used him, so I believe him.

The car hasn't exactly been a "Lemon" but it's had more work on it than any other car I've ever owned. Really seriously bumms me out.

Haven't gotten any real quotes yet. Haven't gotten that far.

We really didn't need this...

[mom-from-missouri]

When you check around for your quotes, don't forget to check with any local votech auto classes or local colleges that teach automechanics. Basically, they learn from your vehicle, and you only pay for the parts.

[CRFSaver]

Go talk to the dealer. It seems GM transmissions are cr@p these days. My fathers impala had his transmission go (couple months ago) and because it only had around 50K, they got GM to pick up part of the price.

[singinjeannie]

Okay, here's the followup to this one. We took it to the dealer and they told us it was something needing to be flushed in the transfer case and the transmission fluid needed to be changed completely.

The other thing they told us was that two new tires we had put on last month were not exactly the same size as the two original tires that were on the van, and because the van is AWD, we needed to change these original tires to match the new ones as it was contributing to the problem of how bad the van was driving.

Right now the van feels right again and the whole thing has cost us about $300.00. I really hope this is the end of it. We put about half of it on a CC and pulled the rest from a savings account that was intended for our Real Estate taxes. We'll have to re-fill this account before the end of August.

[jmjj215]

Glad you didn't have to charge the whole thing. Is it feasible to get that RE tax account back up before Aug? What's your plan of attack?

[singinjeannie]

Yes, it's feasable. I will simply pay less toward my CC debt to get this savings account back where it needs to be. Not ideal, but better than not having the money to pay the Real Estate taxes!

Right now we have $325 going toward a Chase Visa. The minimum monthly payment on this Chase is really only $40.00. This Chase is the next thing on the Debt Snowball, though, so that's where we're concentrating on paying off.

Next month, less will go to Chase and the money taken from the Real Estate tax savings account will go back in.

[Tree0164]

Jeannie
Glad the car didn't cost as much as expected. And it sounds like you a good plan for the RE taxes.