Some cars carry a reputation from the start of their production and long after they’re gone. Some of these cars don’t deserve the ink spilled against them. We’ve all seen hating on the Toyota Prius and cars like the Smart Fortwo. Even the Dodge Journey gets caught up in the crossfire.
Yesterday, Jason asked about the car you find yourself defending the most. Jason went up to bat for the Yugo and the Fiat 500L, H4llelujah gave a lengthy defense on behalf of the Dodge Journey:
The Dodge Journey!
Was it an outdated, mediocre built, unexciting lump of a car that offered a snooze-inducing driving experience? Yes, all of those things.
But towards the end, they were the best option for many families.
Let me explain: In the days leading up to covid, banks weren’t terribly generous with thier lending to people without the best credit, especially on older (cheaper) cars.
So, very often I’d find myself taking care of customers that had a very strict budget, and not the best credit in the world. If someone had a budget of 400 bucks a month, I knew I’d be dealing with a high-teens interest rate on whatever 10 year old 100,000 mile minivan or suv they liked. Trouble was, banks dont like to loan on cars older than 8 years old, or with over 100,000 miles, often putting a nice reliable vehicle either out of reach or at a payment they could barely afford.
Enter the Journey. Dodge would do absolutely terrific terms on these, and they were extremely forgiving of rough credit, sometimes even offering a cash rebate to offset high interest, or flat out just giving an awesome rate to the borrower.
So if someone came in with 4 kiddos to haul around and a 580 credit score, they would come in expecting to pay 500 a month for a 10 year old highlander at 22 percent interest…….Or, they could get a brand new 7 seater with a full warranty with a 10 percent rate.
Overworked dads, tired moms, kids that had never been in a car newer than a 1995, I would see their faces light up in disbelief when I’d pull up a brand new bright red Journey.
I keep tabs on all my customers, and most of them that got into one of these tell me thats when their luck started turning around. No more suprise repairs draining thier bank account. No more adding oil every other fuel stop. No more dropping off thier kids in a rusty old caravan.
The journey sucked as a car, but I watched that one machine bring happiness to a lot of lives.
So the Journey, at least to me, was a damn good vehicle.
I think that context matters. The Dodge Journey may have been the bane of the automotive enthusiast, but it did get families on wheels, and I respect it for that.
David wrote about the advice given by countless car people that you shouldn’t buy a first-year car. Indeed, some cars are just headaches in their first years. Yet, at the same time, maybe you don’t want to buy a final model year, because you don’t know if the automaker has decided to cheap out along the way. Lots of great comments came out of that one, but Sid Bridge keeps his spot as a COTD regular:
This take holds up. The 1901 Curved Dash Oldsmobile had an engine that had cooling issues that were addressed with improvements in 1905. Then again, 1906 introduced a version with a straight-up dashboard. I mean, who wants to buy a Curved Dash Oldsmobile without a Curved Dash? Get it together, Ransom.
Have a great evening, everyone!
I think the Dodge financing thing is also why their sales are down so much. Stellantis simultaneously increased pricing while the credit terms stopped being so generous and all those bad credit buyers that were able to have their luck change at the Dodge dealership 4 years ago no longer have that option.
I think the Dodge financing thing is also why their sales are down so much. Stellantis simultaneously increased pricing while the credit terms stopped being so generous and all those bad credit buyers that were able to have their luck change at the Dodge dealership 4 years ago no longer have that option.
I really appreciate what it did for people and we need more of these cars in the world. However From 2017-2019 I worked for the State of North Carolina for a regional office in Charlotte, we had a bare bones Journey as a fleet vehicle, luckily one of my coworkers was on long term TDY in Raleigh with it because it allowed me to use our enterprise contract instead. Over the two years I probably rented cars over a hundred times and not once did I get something worse than that journey.
the journey with the v6 and the six speed transmission was much better than the base 4 cyclinder with the 4 speed transmission. I think you could also get a 2.4 four cyclinder with a six speed transmission but it was an odd duck that i don’t think they built many of.
I really appreciate what it did for people and we need more of these cars in the world. However From 2017-2019 I worked for the State of North Carolina for a regional office in Charlotte, we had a bare bones Journey as a fleet vehicle, luckily one of my coworkers was on long term TDY in Raleigh with it because it allowed me to use our enterprise contract instead. Over the two years I probably rented cars over a hundred times and not once did I get something worse than that journey.
the journey with the v6 and the six speed transmission was much better than the base 4 cyclinder with the 4 speed transmission. I think you could also get a 2.4 four cyclinder with a six speed transmission but it was an odd duck that i don’t think they built many of.
I have a newfound respect for the Dodge Journey, not something I expected to find today.
Sometimes it is the things you don’t think of, such a great personal anecdote.
I have a newfound respect for the Dodge Journey, not something I expected to find today.
Sometimes it is the things you don’t think of, such a great personal anecdote.
The defense of the Journey here seems to in part validate the Sam Vimes boots theory of socio-economic unfairness.
Linky
Yes. and let’s give Terry Pratchett his due for this genius explanation.
A++ reference and catch.
The defense of the Journey here seems to in part validate the Sam Vimes boots theory of socio-economic unfairness.
Linky
Yes. and let’s give Terry Pratchett his due for this genius explanation.
A++ reference and catch.
damn with faint praise, since this was undoubtedbly the First and Only Defense of a Journey, ever.
Thus it would be the best, the most impassioned, defense ever. 1 of 1.
damn with faint praise, since this was undoubtedbly the First and Only Defense of a Journey, ever.
Thus it would be the best, the most impassioned, defense ever. 1 of 1.
I will still go to bat for the Journey. it was a much better execution of the Mini van to Fake Crossover than GM or really anyone really did. in the end an AWD with a 3.6 pentastar was reliable, cheap and plentiful enough to make them the darlings of the High Interest lots as this guys indicated.
Sadly they were no less lame than even a basic ass RAV4. but they did stay around a long time and did not change much, they did not have to and I applaud the guys at Dodge for just making improvements that mattered, like a more reliable engine over pushing enough changes every couple years to fear the First year design blues on people….every couple of years.
I will still go to bat for the Journey. it was a much better execution of the Mini van to Fake Crossover than GM or really anyone really did. in the end an AWD with a 3.6 pentastar was reliable, cheap and plentiful enough to make them the darlings of the High Interest lots as this guys indicated.
Sadly they were no less lame than even a basic ass RAV4. but they did stay around a long time and did not change much, they did not have to and I applaud the guys at Dodge for just making improvements that mattered, like a more reliable engine over pushing enough changes every couple years to fear the First year design blues on people….every couple of years.
Just gonna point out the power of H4llelujah’s defense of the Journey. In a comment thread where you could talk about the Curved Dash Oldsmobile or the Dodge Journey, everyone is talking about the Dodge Journey.
I know for sure that given the choice between a Journey and a Curved Dash, I would much rather drive the Curved Dash (as long as where we’re going is walking distance).
Just gonna point out the power of H4llelujah’s defense of the Journey. In a comment thread where you could talk about the Curved Dash Oldsmobile or the Dodge Journey, everyone is talking about the Dodge Journey.
I know for sure that given the choice between a Journey and a Curved Dash, I would much rather drive the Curved Dash (as long as where we’re going is walking distance).
The best thing about the Journey is that they are so unwanted that used ones can be had for cheap. The top trim level ones aren’t a terrible place to be.
It’s an appliance car, and it served an extremely good purpose in this use case. Makes me look at it in a little different light. So what if it’s a dated and not great design. Compared to the sad heaps that a family may have to endure versus reliable and relatively well-built new Dodge Journey, I have a little more respect.
That made the day a little brighter. Thank you.
The best thing about the Journey is that they are so unwanted that used ones can be had for cheap. The top trim level ones aren’t a terrible place to be.
It’s an appliance car, and it served an extremely good purpose in this use case. Makes me look at it in a little different light. So what if it’s a dated and not great design. Compared to the sad heaps that a family may have to endure versus reliable and relatively well-built new Dodge Journey, I have a little more respect.
That made the day a little brighter. Thank you.
That’s a great post. Redeems an otherwise lame car.
I drove a really low mileage high trim one as a rental. I’m used to driving shitbox cars so sunroof, fake leather, actual climate control is just pure opulence.
Seemed OK until I drove up a big hill on the freeway and it got stuck in top gear and wouldn’t downshift for some reason so I was flooring it going 45.
That’s a great post. Redeems an otherwise lame car.
I drove a really low mileage high trim one as a rental. I’m used to driving shitbox cars so sunroof, fake leather, actual climate control is just pure opulence.
Seemed OK until I drove up a big hill on the freeway and it got stuck in top gear and wouldn’t downshift for some reason so I was flooring it going 45.
Ugh, I remember making a similar defense of the Altima once and I still want to wash my mouth out with soap. As unreliable of a pile as mine was and as aggressively miserly as the Le Cost Cutting got over its lifetime, they did try to make some reliability improvements to later engines and it serves as an entry point into a new/newer car for a lot of folks out there. I’m convinced that a lot of the haterade is classism, plain and simple. Same goes with the Soul! They’re reasonably priced and everywhere, but they’re a solid entry point into An Car that’s more reliable than a used one for a lot of people. “Do you have reliable transportation?” is a significant barrier to entry into a lot of jobs, sadly, so we need cheap options out there.
Plus, Altima haterade a bit like my “it’s always a frickin’ Ferrari” that I said for a while with Le Mans crashes (hold on, hold on, stay with me here): well, duh, there were a bazillion Ferraris in the field for a while, and the more popular a car is, the more likely that some of its owners are going to get caught doing something stupid in them.
(I still have a grudge against the Altima for what it did to me, though.)
tl;dr—Preach on, H4llelujah. The world still needs aggressively cheap cars.
I agree that the Altima isn’t that bad and its opponents are classist, but being sold cheap to bad credit buyers increases saturation in poor neighborhood with higher rates of unregistered driving and theft, so it’s not just sales volume.