[nostrademons]

The fixed costs still depreciate. You still have to either pay upfront for the car, finance it and pay interest, or lease it, and the car has a fixed lifetime. Repair/maintenance should go in there as well.

I'd be curious how many miles the grandparent has on the car though. My per-mile costs are also sky-high (because it's 10 years old and only has about 40k miles on it - I think it works out to $0.75/mile or so), but the flip side is that if this drives like a normal Honda it should be good for another 150k miles and, if I don't get into an accident or change my driving habits, I will never need to purchase another car.

[bluGill]

Current just over 260,000 miles. This makes a big difference in my per-mileage calculations, as you said, someone who drives less than I did (I had a few contract jobs far from home) would see different numbers.