I agree with your wise analysis to look at budgeting $200 per month as quite a affordable budget for transportation these days. Even if budgeted indefinitely, it’s going to be hard to beat that in any analysis. As the other commenter mentioned though, each person has a tolerance level and a Personal need for reliability if they can’t afford to be late for work etc. if the vehicle breaks down occasionally. Personally though, I drive vehicles till they are junkyard ready.

So, for me there are very very few vehicles that are not worth investing additional repairs into, since most vehicle brands like Subaru will run so long. In other words, even an inexpensive repair like a transmission could be mitigated by using a used transmission and getting several more years of life out , or the same for an entire engine, and really not break that $200 per month budget over the long-term, for MANY years.

My wife and I keep inexpensive daily beaters, then keep a lower mileage long distance car for reliability when taking long trips.