I do this periodically just in case my car should fail miserably one day, which it should any day. I currently have a 1994 Pontiac Bonneville with 196k miles on it. That’s pretty good for an American car, even if it is a luxury sedan. I’m really excited by the Mazda3, 5-door. On the same line as that, I like the Toyota Matrix too. The utilitarian in me says that the hatchback and fold-down seats come in handy when loading miscellaneous things. I do this frequently; so frequently, in fact, that the other vehicle I want is the Nissan Frontier. The problem here is that I want the full-size bed, but I should probably have four humanoid seats available in any car I purchase. I could get the crew cab, but unless it’s brand new, I’m not getting a full-size bed. Besides, I don’t know that I want all that length behind me when I parallel park. The truck isn’t very good on fuel economy, and I’ll be primarily driving back and forth to work – with a carpool (hence the four seats). That leads to two rather obvious solutions. I could get a beater pick-up truck, which wouldn’t bother me at all. I can use it to do all the dirty work, while also enjoying the occasional repair task. The other, possibly cheaper option is to just buy a 4’x8′ trailer and have it all. I’m not too sure about putting a trailer on a Mazda3 or Matrix. Pretty sure that would be the quickest way to wear out a transmission, even if it is manual. Of course, I could put a trailer on my wife’s Element, but I don’t know that it would handle the task much better. My loads would probably be light, a mere 800lbs. at most, so maybe the cars could handle that when properly loaded. Decisions, decisions.