Car shopping

In just under a week I will move to Los Angeles. Among the things that remain on my to do list is to purchase a car. Of course knowing what car I want isn't the problem, after all I worked as a parking valet for over 8 months at a hotel and casino. Ideally I'd like to have a car with a low total cost of ownership. Ownership costs besides the purchase price to consider are insurance, fuel, and scheduled 5 year maintenance/repair cost.

Los Angeles being the auto theft capital of the world and commonly stolen cars typically have higher insurance premiums, I should purchase a car with a below average theft rate. Insure.com lists vehicles most and least expensive to insure as a function of “most likely to be stolen”. Of the 10 least expensive vehicles to insure I could at least imagine driving an impala, grand cherokee, malibu, or sierra pickup. The fuel economy of these vehicles range from a high of 22 city/30 highway for the malibu; and a low of 16 city/ 22 highway for the sierra pickup. Interestingly the vehicles maintenance/repair cost is a flip flop of the cost of insurance premiums. The impala has the least expensive premiums but the highest maintenance/repair cost and the sierra pickup has the highest premiums but the lowest maintenance/repair cost.

At this point I'm removing the sierra pickup from consideration after trying to visualize myself driving a truck in LA. The total of the premiums and maintenance/repair cost makes owning the remaining car virtually the same (12 to 13k for a 5-yr period). The difference is in the fuel economy. And so I'm going to begin a search for an impala (18/28), cherokee (17/21), or malibu (22/32).