Life Event Budgeting: My Car! by Janisha King

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Life Event Budgeting: My Car!

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Okay, so I want a car. I've been riding the obnoxious school bus for 3 years now. It's time for a change.
How would I be able to pay for one?
Do I even need it?
How much would car insurance cost me?

Obviously, I do need a car.
Now, I started working with my uncle late August, 2015. He is a Cadillac mechanic (if that matters)
I worked 5-6 days a week, and made $315-$345 a week on average (my uncle is awesome). I realized that I was getting closer to owning a (nice) car very soon. I didn't care about the type of car, year, or model. That's quite a poor way to approach things, but I was just that eager.
Now, I made an estimated $1,102.5 a month. When the month ends, I barely touch any of the money, aside from $100, more or less. I began to look for car dealerships. Only used cars, though.
After a month or two of working, my uncle mentioned that a friend of his owns a dealership, and that I should stop by if interested. He said that if I ever wanted to buy something from him, he would give me a huge discount. I couldn't refuse.

After about 7 months, I had around $7400 in my bank account. I already had my license by then, so I figured that it is time to finally buy a car.
I showed up at said dealership, and scoped out the cars there. A large number of vehicles there were in very good condition, but two cars caught my eye. A 2009 Jeep Patriot, and a 2002 Jeep Liberty.

The Jeep Patriot was $3500 (with discount). Pretty low, right?
It had 190,000 miles on it (yikes!).
It's a stick shift ( I can drive stick, but I rather not. The Jeep began to look less and less tempting.)
After test driving the car, it went without a hitch. The car is flawless (with the exception of the ridiculous amount of miles that it had). With this, I decided to look at the Jeep Liberty.

The Jeep Liberty is quite older than the Patriot, but it oddly has a lot less miles on the car. It is $3300 (with discount)
It had $130,000 miles on it. It's a little high, but not quite as high as the Patriot. So far, the Liberty is winning.
Now for the test drive. Surprisingly, the Liberty was even quieter compared to the Patriot! Despite its age, the Liberty is flawles

The Jeep Liberty is the clear winner.
At the dealership, my dad was there for moral support, but I got the car on my own
After purchasing the car, it was time to evaluate my insurance costs
I couldn't drive it out of the dealership yet, so the insurance had to come immediately.

Insurance is $2300 every 6 months (yikes)!
Disappointing, but I'll just have to work extremely hard. It's no big deal. The satisfaction of a new car (more or less) is worth it.