AIBU to resist replacing our old cars despite my mother-in-law's comments?

Buy a fault reader from amazon for £20 to see why the engine light is on.

Diesels are for people who consistently drive long distances.

Not always. If you need a large vehicle, especially a van-based one - whether you have a big family, are a wheelchair user or other reasons - many of them are either only available as a diesel or otherwise they offer a woefully-underpowered petrol version that you'd be mad to go for.

'Under warranty' doesn't stop the breakdown and all of its negative effects happening in the first place, though, does it? All it means is that, after you've suffered through it all, eventually got home and managed to get it repaired, somebody else will (hopefully) cover the bill.

You can do whatever you want with your own money. Obviously. It is irrelevant whether your MIL approves.
But, maybe, stop telling her so much.... if she doesn't know that your car broke down, she won't feel obliged to comment!

My first car was old and very unreliable so I did a (free - the days when adult education was free) maintenance course at the college I did my a-levels at. Then I tried to keep up to date. I’m no mechanic but I do know that cam and alternator belts need changing before they snap off and mot, servicing, and replacing before it’s an emergency is important. You can’t have the luxury of cheap cars and the luxury of generalised ignorance about basic maintenance and spend £0 on preventing problems. Two diesels is also an odd choice for homeworkers to pootle to DL in. Diesels are for people who consistently drive long distances. Do you make sure your dpf gets cleaned?

Maybe keep your old cars because you’re okay with the risk. The breakdown on the motorway was very risky and unfortunate, but you guys survived it. Be warned that once one thing starts goes everything starts to go. If it happens again on the motorway, just say your prayers and maybe go behind the barrier. On the other side, though if you do have an accident and you guys don’t make it because older cars aren’t as safe - you won’t need that retirement money..

Enough of the hyperbole please. Don't we get enough maternal guilting thrown at us anyway?

High speed breakdowns are rare and, although statistically likely in older cars, can happen to any age car.

A lot of people do it because it's cheaper to spend, say, 1k on repairs each year than it is to buy a new car outright. Not everyone has savings or can use credit.

Why on earth did you buy such an old car with such a high mileage and especially wasting £3.5k on it!!! Mental!

It is not way similar to home equity , you can free up an investment that you don't need to live in, you choose not to instead choose to borrow.

You seem perfectly happy in choosing to continue using your now unreliable cars on the motorway throwing your one yr old over the batrier as and when necessary so if you're happy with your choices then other opinions don't matter

Shit. I never even knew 😳. I just got the cam belt replaced. (Although I think the alternator belt would have been within the interval anyway).

Do you have them regularly serviced at a reputable garage? Things like drivebelts would be routinely replaced under regular maintenance.

Not often and they’d be under warranty. I don’t understand people who drive bangers when it’s costing a fortune for the upkeep

It's an odd logic to have over 100K in investments and be borrowing money off your parents and buying old, increasingly unreliable cars.

I'm certainly not advocating buying a new car every 3 years on finance, or spunking all your hard-acquired savings and investments but there can be a middle ground.

With a small child reliability is crucial and older cars are likely to be less reliable.

Many new cars go into paralysis mode if hit, even minor hits. My dh is forever having to do road closures to get broken down vehicles towed because they need to be taken to the dealership and be plugged into the computer to release them.

More importantly, why does your mil think she has a say in what you drive? I find that absolutely mad! Both of our cars are 20 years+. I have no intention of buying anything newer.

How does she know how much money you have? I would be furious if my husband discussed our finances with his parents.

YANBU to be honest, I am the same way with an old car and money invested rather than buying a new car.

If your cars are reliable and the repairs are a one-off and they have plenty of life in them yet, there is zero chance I'd be looking to replace them. I'd rather have money for retirement later on than a new car now and be broke and unable to stop working when I choose.

There absolutely is a replacement schedule! Mine is booked to be done in a couple of weeks as it’s due.

They should be replaced every 50-100k or every 5 years 🤷‍♀️

Well if you owe your parents money and you have savings then pay them back now.
It is entirely up to you what car you drive but I wouldn’t want to be breaking down with a young child in the car.
My car is 11 years old. I will keep driving it but when it becomes unreliable I will replace it.

I agree that it's none of your parents' business.

But equally, I think you've been lucky with repair costs. I've got a 12 year old car that I'm in the process of replacing because repairs are becoming more frequent and more expensive. I would certainly be looking to get something much newer if I were you.

We do our servicing ourselves so ensure that all the relevant filters are replaced - not all of these are replaced at every service so they can easily be overlooked.
We had to replace the battery on one of our cars as it stopped working. We checked the average time to expect out of a battery and it turned out it was a typical time for it to go. The battery on our other car was similar age so we had that checked and that was also near the end of its life so we replaced that too.
One car needed it's spark plugs and coil packs we checked the other car and they needed them doing soon too. We did them 6 months later.

We check the cars over every 3-6 months.

For older cars only doing a check every mot is the bare minimum. For the most part the MOT shouldn't flag anything you weren't already expecting. They aren't for telling you when repairs are due they are a safety net for ensuring there aren't cars on the road in a dangerous condition. It can also be quite varied what gets picked up/documented on an MOT. It's not compulsory to include advisories on the MOT certificate and we have things that come up one year but not the next. For example we had a chipped corner in the number plate of one of previous cars. It did not in anyway impact the reading of the number plate or mean that it was liable for coming detached from the car. It showed up as an advisory every couple of MOTs

Any car can break down. You sound very financially astute, new cars are for people who want to spend their whole lives in debt. Be different!