Flipboard 2025 Car Tips

If you leased a car and now don’t need it, the goal is pretty simple: get out with the least amount of money left on the table. The tricky part is that leases are designed to keep you locked in, and the “easy” exit options are often the expensive ones. The good news is you usually have more than one path out.

One second the roof looked normal, and the next there was a deafening bang followed by broken glass. Now the dealer says it’s an insurance issue, while you’re wondering why a factory-installed roof wouldn’t fall under the warranty.

That little scrape on the door you got in the parking garage? Those light scratches from everyday use? It’s easy to worry about whether a few cosmetic imperfections will turn into an unexpected bill. The good news is that with most leasing companies, whether you’ll be charged depends on how deep the damage goes and whether it crosses the line into “excessive” territory.

Pickup trucks were originally designed around hauling, towing, and getting work done rather than recreating the interior of a luxury sedan. Ford's early F-Series trucks used purpose-built truck platforms, while comfort features gradually became more important as pickups increasingly served families as well as workers. Today's high-end trucks can offer leather upholstery, massage seats, premium audio systems, enormous displays, and sophisticated driver assistance technology. For drivers who grew up with simpler machines, some of the old features still have undeniable appeal.

To my father, his enormous old sedan is not simply a machine sitting in the driveway. He knows exactly how the steering feels, where every control is located, and how the car behaves on familiar roads. Asking him to replace it can therefore sound less like financial advice and more like asking him to surrender something that represents independence.

EV charging can save money, but higher insurance and repair costs may eat into those gains. Here’s how to decide whether an electric vehicle still makes financial sense.

The price was settled. The money was sitting in the bank. All that remained was handing over a check and driving home. Instead, the dealer rejected the payment and started pushing a loan nobody had asked for. That may be perfectly normal—or the moment this deal stopped smelling right.

The rental car has four wheels, an automatic transmission and a cupholder roughly the size of a thimble. How different could driving it really be? Very different. Some completely ordinary American driving habits are prohibited across large parts of Europe, and “but everyone does that back home” is not much of a defense.

Buying a new vehicle felt like a major upgrade. It came with navigation, smartphone integration, remote features, and driver assistance systems that promised to make every trip easier. Then I discovered the car was also recording far more information about my driving than I ever realized.

Bought a used car with the previous owner’s unpaid parking tickets? Learn when you’re responsible, how registration holds work, and what documents can help you dispute old citations successfully quickly.