Transportation...What Next?

I woke up this morning, jammed up against silky furriness...nope, it wasn't one of the dogs. Husband, with his glossy hair, hairy eyebrows and goatee, is home! Gee, I missed that man. And he missed me, too.

We had a luxurious sleep-in, waffles for breakfast, and now I'm trying to get my act together and finish some work before it gets dark.

We have an interesting problem looming. Currently there are two vehicles parked in the Brick driveway -- the 2000 Jeep Cherokee that's been our mainstay car, plus a low-slung Toyota Celica sportscar owned by Daughter #1. She hasn't been driving it for more than a year...she had no place to park it in Denver, and was getting by easier using the bus and lightrail system. She made a deal with us -- if we'd store it, plus pay for insurance and any repairs, we could use it anytime we wanted.

That's worked out very well for the past year. Husband often takes the Celica to work; he enjoys driving a sporty car, and that leaves the Jeep at home for when I need it. That tune will be changing this weekend -- one of Daughter's buddies at work wants to buy it. We'll drive the car into Denver tomorrow for him to take a look...and, I assume, finish the transaction.

Which puts us back to one car. The extra vehicle has been a help, but is it worth it to get a second car?

PROS:
*We'd have it when we needed it
*We could get a make and model that does better on gas (the Jeep only does about 18 mpg at best)
*I could use it for driving to gigs further away
*We have the money -- if we take it out of the retirement account

*What about colder weather -- especially winter? Will we want to walk, bike or 'scoot?' (see below)

CONS:
*THE COST -- not just for the car, but for the license, title and all those goodies of regular ownership.
*I often don't use the Jeep sitting in the driveway, and could do many jobs in the hours between dropping Husband off and picking him up. (Husband's office is only about 2 miles away.)
*It could be just as cheap to rent a car for longer gigs
*Business errands can often be done in the evenings -- along with many other errands

Husband isn't thrilled about the idea of me home without a vehicle, but I think we'd be fine. We live on a hill above a shopping area -- the grocery store is only about 15 min. walk away, along with Home Depot, Michael's and a dollar store! (And frankly, I could use the extra exercise.) The employees for Brickworks can help out with pickups and dropoffs at the post office. (Or I can do it at night, especially for shipping orders.) If things get extra busy, our mail lady will pick up priority boxes directly from Brickworks.

There are also bicycles and scooters to consider. Either would be cheaper than a second car, wouldn't require insurance, and Husband has been talking about biking to work, anyways. (He could use the extra exercise, too.)

I think you can see which direction I've been leaning towards...but is this the right one? I have to do a day's worth of appraisals early next week, as well as get a colonoscopy on Tuesday. (Thankfully, a friend will take me to and from the latter.) It would be so much easier to get these done without worrying whether I have a car to do them with.

What to do, what to do...


P.S. Someone else went through this dithering. But his issue was whether to replace a previously reliable vehicle that was getting old -- and starting to act up. Has some parallels to our situation, though.