Q: My car has a lot of mileage. Is it road worthy?

Every single part on a motor vehicle will eventually fail or "wear out", and often parts will fail multiple times over the vehicle’s life (for example, tires, brakes, rotors, water pumps, oil seals, timing belts, bulbs, hoses, and so forth). Once you reach a high enough accumulated mileage, regular breakdowns or at least "problems" are actually not all that unusual.

In your circumstance, I would worry less about whether all that should have occurred in that specific interval and simply just be sure that the failures actually occurred or showing symptoms.

In other words, be sure the mechanic provides you with your old failed parts and also shows you clear evidence of actual diagnostic work (test results and a logical compelling explanation for why the work was needed) for all of the parts you’ve listed.

Cars today are immensely more reliable than those made 30 or 40 years ago. In the 1960’s, getting 100,000 miles out of a car was a miracle. Today, a car with 100,000 miles on it is can almost be considered essentially new (a bit of an exaggeration but you know what I mean).

Getting back to your maintenance headaches of late - even though you have had quite a few repairs, as long as you have an economic option to make the repairs (i.e., a mechanic who knows what he or she is doing and charges a reasonable rate) it will always be cheaper to keep the car as opposed to buying a new one in my eyes. I often point out to people that the sales tax alone on a new $20,000 vehicle amounts to $1,400, and that’s just the beginning of the extraordinary costs if you buy a new car. If you finance the car, you have to buy insurance to protect the creditor. The point is you can buy a lot of repairs for $1,400. Basically, in my opinion, the thing to do with cars is keep them until the frame has rusted away unless you are ready to take on the purchase of a new car. If you need any services done on your car, a qualified professional from YourMechanic can come to your car’s location to perform any needed repairs or diagnostics.