Scamming $2.1 million to buy a POS car?

[Dave1982]

http://news.yahoo.com/5-years-ore-wo...040500080.html

Woman manages to scam her way into a $2.1 million tax refund. Needless to say once they figured it out they threw her in jail. She says she's remorseful, but of course we all know she's only sorry because she was caught.

But what really puzzles me is the part where it says one of her purchases made with her cool $2.1 million......was $1800 in cash for a 1999 Dodge Caravan?

Are you shitting me? Really? If I had that kind of cash I'd be walking into a dealership and driving way with a brand-new top-of-the-line van, not a 14 year old used POS.

That's like winning the lottery then retiring to a tiny one-bedroom apartment and feasting on Ramen noodles for the rest of your life.

[AccountingDrone]

Could be she had a sentimental link to the POS in question, I was really fond of a number of vehicles I have owned.

My first car ever, an ugly little 58 Nash Metropolitan, 3 years older than I was and I paid $200 for, took me all summer to save enough to buy it, register and insure it. Blue and white like this one.

This 1984 *diesel* Ford Escort that nobody seems to know ever existed. Took back to back round trips from Norfolk to California chugging away dependably. Mine was in the generic ford burgundy red. We got it used as an off lease turn in for cheap because nobody in the US can apparently drive a 5 speed manual car.

The absolute classic Mom Van. If you look up Mom Van in a dictionary, this is probably the car in the picture. The 1984 Dodge Caravan in burgundy. We got ours used for $500 at a car sale at the local cop's auction from seized cars. It had the very comfortable captains chairs that rotated in front, the 2 person bench but did not come with the 3 person back bench. We put 10 years and around 175000 miles on it before some dumb batshit broad decided to randomly pull in front of mrAru on a totally empty stretch of rt 2 in CT at 8 pm at night one july. Forced him into the guard rail, totalling out the poor dear thing.

My 1971 not-a-superbeetle . Great little car to bomb around in, just have to make sure that if the belt goes you stop IMMEDIATELY or you will fry the engine. You also carry a spare belt! More people know about the superbeetle that the plain old bug was pretty much ignored.

1971 Opel Rekord C. Great little spud of a car. We had something like one of the last 700 registered running ones left in the US back about 10 years ago =) Of course I automatically spell it record We finally got rid of it about 3 years ago to a collector who had more moeny than we did to maintain it.

Chevy s10. Our first, a 1984 named Zombie was amazing. We bought it off a navy guy who was being moved to a new duty station and didn't want to take the truck with him. We picked it up for $500 in 94, and drove it until it finally couldn't be resurrected any more in 2006. Ugly spud that had been totalled out and bought back from the insurance company, bent frame and all. We liked it so much we got a second generation one, a 2001 that is sitting in our drive right now, benefit of Freecycle. She had some silly little electronic module screwed up that mrAru knew how to immediately repair.

And finally, my Baby. I had a 1979 International Harvester Scout. Absolutely no sport in that, straight utility vehicle. $2000 in 1989, best 2k I have ever spent on a vehicle. I put 250 000 miles on top of the 89000 miles, and needed to replace the water pump. We rebuilt the engine because mrAru had 30 days leave and nothing better to do, and then got another 200 000 miles out of her before mrAru hit a patch of black ice and put her through the ubiquitous new england stacked stone fence, over several saplings and then ended up wedged between 2 2 foot diameter oak trees. After winching himself back to the road, he drove home 5 miles on no radiator and copiously leaking oil pan [sorry environment] but what finally made her take the final trip to the junk yard was the broken frame. We got $800 for the engine, and good money [not sure of the amounts] from other parts. In the way of keeping her on the road over the years we secured the last official factory parts out of the IH parts system thanks to the parts guy at the IH dealership being a closet Scout lover knowing how to work the system. Oversized engine, the one for the *school bus* in the ute body meant that I could blow through a tank of gas and out-accelerate a porsche up an entrance ramp that was already at highway speed. Poor silly officer, spending in a year on insurance what it cost me to *buy* the entire scout. At the time, IIRC I was paying $200 a *year* insurance. For an amazingly sturdy no-nonsense ute, you can not go wrong with a classic scout.

Of all the spuds, I would love to have a great condition minivan, or a mint condition 79 scout like Baby. I would definitely say that if we won the lottery tomorrow, I would seriously consider revisiting the vehicles of my past. Keep your testarosa.

[Javarod]

While it is weird, can't fault her choice, those damn things are indestructible. Seriously, i had a gen 3 (96-01 IIRC) Caravan as a cab driver, a 96 that leaked everything, but was more reliable than any other minivan the company had, and i still see tons of those being used to this day, in fact one was used for deliveries at the paper when i worked there.

[wolfie]

If I won the lotto, I'd either get the same model of car that I have now but in better condition, or "bite the bullet" and get mine fixed up (would cost several times the book value). It's got several features I like that are not available on anything in current production. That should hold me for a few years until I can get my "dream car" - and what car is that?

Start with a 1st or 2nd generation Grand Caravan/Grand Voyager (decision time: do I go with a 1987, the first model year offered, and the last model year which was ever allowed to "age out" of Ontario's Drive Clean program, or do I go for one after the driver's side sliding door was added?) Swap in a 1st generation (i.e. wastegated turbo) VW TDI (1997-1999 Golf/Jetta, don't get one from a 1996-1997 Passat because the layout is wrong, and those cars are collectors items anyway), and fit a roof rack from (or at least based on) the current Subaru Outback (cross rails stow in the fore-and-aft position for low air resistance, but are always there for when you need them).