Is it really cheaper to keep your old vehicle?

That question comes up every time an older vehicle needs another repair, another inspection item, or another set of tires, and it usually gets answered with a shrug, a guess, or a story about somebody’s uncle driving a truck to 400,000 miles. In a recent video on Purple Collar Life, host Chad decided to answer it a different way by going back through roughly a decade of receipts for his family’s 2009 Ford Expedition and laying out the actual numbers.

What makes his breakdown useful is that it is not built on theory. Chad says he went through repair bills, maintenance records, tire purchases, and other ownership costs from the time they bought the Expedition used until now, after putting more than 100,000 miles on it. His conclusion, at least for this vehicle, is that keeping an older SUV on the road turned out to be much cheaper than many people would expect.

That does not mean an old vehicle is always the better financial move in every case, and Chad is careful not to claim that. But his numbers do show why so many people are willing to keep fixing a vehicle they already own rather than taking on the monthly cost of something newer.

What They Bought And How Long They Kept It

Chad explains that his family bought the Expedition about ten years ago when it had 82,185 miles on it. The original window sticker showed an MSRP of $46,320, but by the time they found it used, it had already dropped sharply in price. He says it was listed at $19,700, marked down to $18,600, and after some negotiating, they brought it home for $16,700.

At the time, he says, it felt like a solid deal for a full-size SUV with a lot of features and comfort, and over the years they have used it enough to give the numbers some real meaning. Chad says the vehicle now has about 184,300 miles, which means they added 102,115 miles during their ownership.

That kind of mileage is important because it moves this discussion out of the “light use” category. This was not a third vehicle sitting in a garage and only driven on weekends. It was a real family vehicle that accumulated enough miles to show what older-vehicle ownership actually looks like when a family continues depending on it year after year.

Chad Split The Costs Into Repairs And Maintenance

One of the smartest parts of Chad’s breakdown is that he separates repairs from maintenance, because people often blur those two together and end up making the numbers look worse, or better, than they really are.

In his system, repairs were things that had to be fixed to keep the Expedition running, safe, or able to pass Pennsylvania inspection. Maintenance, on the other hand, covered the predictable wear items and routine work that any vehicle will need over time, such as oil changes, filters, inspections, brakes, and tires.

He also notes that while his records go back a full decade of ownership, the actual repair receipts begin in 2018, which was the first time the Expedition needed a repair after they bought it. He admits a few small things may be missing, such as wiper blades and perhaps some minor service items, but says the overall total is very close and good enough to tell the real story.

That distinction matters because a lot of people talk about what an old vehicle “costs” them without separating the normal cost of owning any vehicle from the extra cost of keeping an aging one alive. Chad’s numbers are much more helpful because they keep those categories apart.

The Repair Total Was Lower Than He Expected

According to Chad, the Expedition needed a fairly normal list of older-vehicle fixes over the past ten years, including a steering shaft, alternator, brake lines, a full exhaust replacement, a heater door actuator, a repair to the rear hatch where corrosion had developed, and a recent rocker panel repair that cost about $950.

None of those repairs sounds especially pleasant when it hits all at once, and if someone heard that list without the totals, they might assume the truck had become a money pit. But Chad says that when he added up the repair side alone, the total came to $3,456.17 over ten years.

Spread across a full decade, that number is not nearly as severe as many people might expect for a full-size SUV approaching 185,000 miles. In fact, it works out to a little over $345 a year in repairs, which is far less than many monthly payments on a newer vehicle.

This is probably where the conversation gets interesting. People often react emotionally to repairs because they come in irregular chunks and feel painful in the moment, while a monthly payment becomes background noise simply because it arrives on schedule. Chad’s numbers are a useful reminder that a repair bill can feel dramatic without necessarily being expensive in the broader ownership picture.

Maintenance Cost More, But That Is True For Any Vehicle

On the maintenance side, Chad includes the usual list: oil changes, filters, inspections, brakes, tires, oil undercoating, seasonal tire changeovers, and one upgrade, a new head unit for Apple CarPlay and navigation.

He says those maintenance costs totaled $3,920.56 over the same period. Tires were the biggest single contributor, which is not surprising for a heavy SUV. According to Chad, the family bought two sets of all-season tires and one set of Bridgestone Blizzak winter tires, and tires alone accounted for about $2,080 of that maintenance total. Brakes, rotors, and calipers added another $466.

That is where his presentation stays fair. He is not pretending the Expedition was cheap in every way or that it needed nothing. He is simply showing that normal maintenance, even when it includes multiple sets of tires and brake work, still did not push the cost anywhere near what many people assume.

And to be honest, this is one of the easiest things to forget in these conversations. A newer vehicle may avoid some repairs for a while, but it still needs tires, brakes, inspections, fluids, and routine care. Those costs do not disappear just because the vehicle is newer.

So What Did It Really Cost To Keep It Running?

When Chad combines repairs and maintenance, the total comes to $7,376.73 over about 114 months, just short of ten full years.

That means the average cost to keep the Expedition running worked out to roughly $65 a month.

He says that number honestly surprised him, and it is easy to see why. A lot of owners of older vehicles feel like they are constantly paying for something, but once those costs are spread over nearly a decade, the monthly average becomes much smaller than the stress of any one bill makes it feel.

Chad also breaks it down by mileage. Repairs alone worked out to about 3 cents per mile, while repairs and maintenance together came to about 7 cents per mile driven.

Then he adds the purchase price into the equation. Including the $16,700 they paid for the Expedition, their total cost of ownership comes out to $24,076.73, which he says works out to roughly 24 cents per mile over the entire time they have owned it.

That is the number that probably matters most if someone wants the clearest answer to the title question. Based on Chad’s actual receipts, yes, keeping this old vehicle was cheaper than many people would assume, and much cheaper than replacing it with something newer.

The Comparison To A Newer Truck Makes The Difference Clear

To show why the Expedition’s numbers matter, Chad compares them with the family’s 2023 Ford F-150 Lightning, which they bought used.

He says that in just the first nine months of owning the Lightning, dividing the truck payments by the miles driven puts the cost at about $1.16 per mile. He also notes that insurance on the Expedition runs $84 a month, even with a teenage driver, while insurance on the Lightning is around $200 a month. Registration for the old SUV costs them $80 a year, while registration and road-use fees for the Lightning come to $464 a year.

Chad is fair enough to say these are very different vehicles, and that is true. The Lightning is newer, more advanced, and more capable in several ways. But his point is not that the two are identical. It is that when you look strictly at ownership cost, the old SUV is dramatically cheaper to keep on the road.

That is where this discussion usually lands in real life. Most people know a newer vehicle is nicer. The harder question is whether it is worth the extra money, especially if the older one still does what the family needs it to do.

Sometimes Fixing What You Have Makes More Sense

By the end of the video, Chad says the Expedition is still comfortable, still reliable, and still useful for everything his family needs.

He does acknowledge that older vehicles need repairs and that rust can become a serious problem, especially in places like Pennsylvania where salt is used heavily in winter. He says they have tried to stay ahead of that by oil-undercoating the vehicle every year, including the frame, undercarriage, and body panels, which he considers a very important step in keeping an older vehicle alive in that climate.

He also mentions a likely exhaust manifold leak that has been making a ticking sound for about two years without causing any real operating trouble so far, which is a good reminder that even a successful old-vehicle story is still a living story. The costs do not stop forever. They just may remain manageable.

Still, Chad’s larger point is hard to miss. When he finally put the receipts together, the Expedition had not cost nearly as much to keep as many people might expect, and compared with the monthly burden of a much newer truck, the old SUV looked financially pretty sensible.

That does not settle the debate for everyone, because every vehicle, climate, and owner situation is different. But if the question is whether it can really be cheaper to keep an old vehicle, Chad’s numbers offer a pretty convincing answer: sometimes, very much so.