Our own car in the USA: bought for $3735 in 2017, sold for $3750

We flew into Los Angeles at the end of May 2017, and the very next day we bought a car — from the very first listing, somehow right away and fast. It was a 2006 Toyota Camry Solara: a 2.4-liter engine, 159 horsepower, and 240,000 kilometers on the odometer. The asking price was 3750 dollars, and we haggled it down to 3735 — at 2017 prices.

The next morning went to registering the car at the DMV, the American equivalent of Russia's traffic police. We returned the rental car a day early, and they refunded us for the unused day — something we hadn't even hoped for. But while we were running errands in the rental, the car we had bought stood on the street during exactly the hours when the street is cleaned and parking is not allowed. That's how a line we hadn't planned for appeared in our budget: a parking ticket.

After the transfer, the title is sent by mail. Ours caught up with us only in early July, in Vancouver, Washington. Really, it's needed only when you sell, but we felt calmer having it in the car.

The car also became our home. Most often we slept right in it — at rest areas along the highways and in Walmart parking lots, sometimes at campgrounds.

In early August we changed the oil in Milwaukee. The Toyota's fuel consumption came out at about 7 liters per 100 kilometers, and over the whole trip we spent 1180 dollars on gas — at 2017 prices. In total, we drove 27,000 kilometers in five months.

Back in August we had bought tickets from San Francisco to Phuket for October 16. By the end of September our trip across the States was essentially over, and changing the flight would have cost about half the price of the tickets — so it was time to sell the car.

Before the sale, we spent three days washing, buffing, and polishing our Solara.

We posted the ad in Morgan Hill, and by evening the car had already been bought. There are almost no formalities: the seller signs the title and hands it over in exchange for the money, and the buyer transfers the car into their own name. In 2017 we sold it for 3750 dollars — the same as had been asked for it in the spring, and 15 dollars more than we had paid ourselves. Only a few days were left before our flight, and we rented a Ford Fusion Hybrid.

How buying a car, insurance, and car taxes work in the USA — see the post “Driving across the USA: useful information and tips from our experience”.