Sometimes being a dad with a mortgage means trading the Land Rover Discovery for a Subaru Forester. I kept the manual transmission. That was the last stand of independence.
The 2011 Forester — “Fozzie” — made sense: the Discovery had 175,000 miles on it, I wanted better fuel economy, more cargo space, and something with AWD that didn’t require specialist Land Rover maintenance. I bought it through an internet sales department at a non-Subaru dealership in Manhattan Beach, about two years old.
It leaked oil more than normal. In retrospect, the previous owner had likely overheated it. The kind of thing a specialist inspection would have caught; a generic dealer inspection didn’t.
At 125,000 miles, the engine and transmission failed catastrophically. The Subie Shop in Oceanside — a Subaru specialist — replaced both. Cost: $8,746.
Here’s the thing: Fozzie still came out ahead. In 7.8 years and 128,000 miles, the per-mile cost was $0.30 — the lowest of any vehicle I’ve owned. The 23 MPG fuel savings over that distance paid for the engine replacement. Catastrophic failure, math still wins.
Contrast: a new Land Cruiser at the time would have run $1,248 a month. The Forester, catastrophic failure and all, cost less than that on an annualized basis.
Generic dealer, unknown inspection history, inherited the previous owner’s damage. Specialist shops like Subie Shop do quality work. The Forester ran fine for 46,000 miles after the rebuild, then I replaced it with the Lexus GX.