My wife and I have usually had two cars, but we have saved money on cars by keeping cars much longer than we would have otherwise. This has partly been due to lowered mileage/maintenance, but the greater part is that I am willing to own a much junkier 2nd car since I rarely need it to depend on it get to work. If we absolutely always needed it to be reliable, I would definitely own a nicer one instead. Therefore, we have gone pretty long stretches with no car payment at all. Right now we have a paid off 2008 and hope (knock on wood) to get a couple more years out of our 1998 minivan. We got the van for cheap in the first place partly because it had a lot of miles on it. Insurance is relatively low on that one because it isn't worth much (it's relative because auto insurance here is pretty expensive no matter what). In case no one else has mentioned it, you could see if there is a low-mileage discount for auto insurance.

Jim S.