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All for one or one for all?

  • One "do-everything" vehicle.

    Votes: 20 18.0%
  • Two or more vehicles for different purposes.

    Votes: 91 82.0%

What's your philosophy: Have one do-it-all vehicle or multiple "specialized" ones?

6K views 127 replies 88 participants last post by  adrew 
#1 ·
Given a choice (and if I had the space), I think having the everyday commuter and the occasional fun car would be ideal.

What works for you?



 
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#121 ·
I'd have twenty cars if I could afford it. Three is a good compromise in my mind. One for doing normal people things, one for going briskly, and another for going where the others can't. I'd love to add one for top-down motoring, but I have nowhere to put any more cars. I'm already looking crazy with two street-parked, a camper in my driveway, and my garage filled with my car, motorcycles, and parts.
 
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#2 ·
The salt/daily driving with harsh winters and road chemicals kicks the **** out of cars here.

My philosophy:
- Relatively cheap daily driver that's disposable at the end of its term (buy a newer used car and drive it ~10 years max then ditch it and repeat).
- Fun weekend toy/classic that is fairweather only and garage kept
- Track toy to go buckwild with and get the speeding out of your system. This keeps you from modding the weekend toy as much and away from tickets.
- Lifted Jeep with a 4.0L for off-roading/camping.
 
#3 ·
For me it comes down to financials at the moment. I currently have the Focus ST as the "one size fits all" which I just paid off. The long term strategy is to keep the ST till it rots away and pick up a weekend sports car some time in the next 3-5 years. I love the ST as a daily driver and have modded it while keeping it tame for DD use but I still have the want for something more exciting for specials trips or potential track use.
 
#4 ·
Depends on what the specialized uses are.

Heavy towing? You might want a large truck for that, but daily drive something less cumbersome.

Difficult off-road use? You might want something highly capable of off-road driving, but daily drive something that is nicer on the road.

Cruising around in an RV? You probably do not want the RV as your daily driver when you are at home.

Track driving? You may find a Miata not very comfortable or practical in regular driving.

On the other hand, just carrying cargo bigger than what fits in a sedan may lead you to a hatchback or station wagon that can do it all with minimal compromise.
 
#7 ·
My 3 car fleet covers the whole spectrum, I don't think you can have your cake and eat it too when it comes to jack of all trade type vehicles.

2013 Mustang GT Convertible - Manual Trans, top down, mile eater. Fast, fun, and thirsty.

2017 Cooper S ALL4 Clubman - Manual Trans, AWD, family car. Still tons of fun, big Pano sunroof, all weather warrior.

2000 Explorer - AWD, 5.0 V8, the Mulch and Dog hauler with a hitch on the back.
 
#9 · (Edited)
Our timing has been messed up with life changes so right now we just have two practical ones.

Corolla = wife's, road trip car
Yaris = my commuter, hauls bulky things

My next will be something fun - I either want a well-kept MR-S or older Miata, or an ND or S-FR or whatever the new small Toyota sports car ends up being. I'd love to live somewhere with good enough mass transit that we could have one fun car.
 
#13 ·
Our timing has been messed up with life changes so right now we just have two practical ones.

Corolla = wife's, road trip car
Yaris = my commuter, hauls bulky things

My next will be something fun - I either want a well-kept FR-S or older Miata, or an ND or S-FR or whatever the new small Toyota sports car ends up being. I'd love to live somewhere with good enough mass transit that we could have one fun car.
Something like this. Except we have a Civic and Corolla. Ideally I'd have a Civic or Corolla + 4Runner and Miata, but we only have parking for 2 right now and we're both driving 30k+ a year. Hoping to move and buy a house within the next year so we'll see what happens.
 
#10 ·
Got the Volt to DD on my 100mi round trip commute and pull numbers like this (out of a Gen 1 16 kWh battery)



Ditching our POS Golf and getting a CR-V to haul the family around (but the Volt works fine for that too).
 
#11 ·
I tried the do it all car.. didn't like the result. If I'm just going to have one I'd prefer to have one focused (sports) car and pick up a rental from time to time when I need a different set of capabilities (only really comes up when I need more room to move things about)
 
#12 ·
I've had up to 10 cars at once. Normally I like multiple cars for multiple roles. My daily driver isn't going to pull the 35 ft travel trailer, and the tow rig wont' be a fun backroads carver. And I don't want to drive the fun car every day. Also, the 2 door convertible is great for weekend fun drives, but the sedan is better for inclement weather commuting and errand running. I tried the one car for everything and was quite annoyed by the lack of being good enough in any one area.
 
#14 ·
I'm in the "multiple car" crowd.

My e30 is the fast n' fun car... and nice weather daily

The e34 Touring is the DD for all the other days, and being a wagon it is the "haul stuff/road trip car".

Only issue with both of them is that they are more or less confined to paved surfaces. Which is why I'm hoping to be in the market for some older truck/suv thing for off-road capability and some light towing.

The only single car of recent that has my attention and may be able to check all those boxes for me is the Volvo v90CC. But at the current price it is far from being in the cards at the moment.
 
#15 ·
Voted for two. Assuming you can afford it, there are lots of good reasons to have one "normal" car, then one that can be a toy or winter beater.

Right out of college in Minnesota, I had a CRX Si as a winter beater, and it made a great autocross car too - probably since rust made it lighter than stock :laugh:
 
#17 ·
Elantra - Reliable daily for my wife. Put gas and oil in it and drive it and don't think about it.
BMW 530 - Enjoyable daily driver that is mostly reliable and fun to drive.
Suburban - Hauls the family, maybe a trailer and a ton of stuff. Super roomy vacation-mobile.
Dodge Ram - haul heavy things and people in comfort.
Scout - River rat. dirty 4x4
Camaro - Good old American Muscle
Bug - Classic fun, Family heritage
'31 Chevy Truck - pre-war classic with yard work duties to keep it lubed and running.

Clearly, you can see my philosophy.

Chris
 
#18 ·
I'm definitely a multi-car kinda guy. As someone else in this forum once said (the last time this idea was discussed): "When you're a car guy, what's better than having one car? Having two cars. And what's better than having two cars? Having five cars."

Personally, five cars is right about at my personal sweet spot for happiness.
 
#19 ·
Put me in the multiple car category. Each car serves a host of needs...

Mazda3 - wife's car, our trip car, and my occasional commuter when the M3 is down
Frontier - hauler, flex car for if one of the others isn't available for whatever reason (repairs, someone else needs the Mazda, etc)
M3 - my fun car, autocross/track car, DD, 'other' trip car (already taken it to Watkins Glen, will be taking it to NJMP this weekend).

The bike sees a few thousand miles a year, mostly commuter miles, but that makes only a small dent in our annual miles.

Ironically I've put the most mileage on the M3 recently: 6k in 6 months of ownership, including 2 months down for a head gasket repair. I suspect that this is not the making of a long term solution, but it's how it is at the moment.

With the amount of miles that my wife and I drive (50k+ annually) having a fleet of rotating cars means less wear on any single car. I like to think that would justify the extra insurance ($30/mo for the M3) and repair costs, which I treat as a hobby cost anyway.
 
#20 ·
I don't know where I stand on this. I have three cars and all of them could be considered "do it all" cars. The least practical of the bunch can still hold four adults, pick up my kid, and be a serviceable commuter for me.

I obviously like the specialized route but I also like redundancy and a certain amount of overlap. But my insurance bill is $400/mo...
 
#57 ·
Yeah, that's nuts. I do recall him saying that he likes to speed though, so that might be part of it. Plus, downforce. Using that everyday doesn't come cheap.

I'm a one car* kinda guy. I tried the multi-car thing, but it wasn't for me. Back when in my mid/late-20s, I had an '01 Boxster, '01 IS300, and '07 Outback Sport at the same time. "Gee, do I take the Lexus or the Porsche to work today?" and all of that. All cool cars, and it was fun to have variety, but it was expensive, occasionally annoying, and I'd rather have more bikes taking up garage space than a car or two that I rarely drive. Due to a cross-country move, I was sort of forced to consolidate all three down to one car (winner: '08 Si sedan). That worked out quite a lot better.

*Assuming my wife also has a CUV of some sort.
 
#21 ·
I'm guilty of the multiple cars I may not really need

Tahoe for work/haul the kids around

CC I can use for work, or haul kids around, but not both. I really like how it drives for a DD that is not too flashy

Silverado because pickup truck

997 turbo, just because

XC90 the family mobile.

X....
 
#64 ·
"KAR 120C" doesn't answer any questions. Speak anglish.
 
#24 ·
My goal is to get a project car to build for the track eventually, enter auto x events and local hill climbs, something cheap like a older 90's Toyota or Honda I can swap and build up for cheap and pound the tar out of lol.
I do like a spirited daily driver though.


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