I always thought it was a good example that new cars don’t have to be uneconomical per se if you just drive them yourself long enough.
Yes, that is certainly true for many cars. But the problem remains that you have to pay for the purchase. I always think of an acquaintance and her family when it comes to this topic. Both have low incomes, so they barely get by. But thanks to the village, nothing works without a car. So they buy cheap old cars, repair what they can themselves, so they can manage to get through the TÜV and get from A to B for as long as possible, which is never for long. However, they would not get a loan for a sufficiently large new car and of course cannot pay for it out of savings. In the long run, it probably would not be more expensive and certainly less stressful to have had a new car.