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Originally Posted by JSH
Whether or not that is feasible depends a lot on where you live. Some friends of mine live in an apartment and parking is $100 a month. That pretty much kills any savings from keeping an extra car around. Of course they also aren't allowed to do any work on a car on the apartment property and all cars must be licensed and running. So any work on the car is going to take place at a mechanic for $100 to $150 per hour.
Plenty of areas have city ordinances or HOAs that don't allow non-running cars or cars parked anywhere except for in the driveway. (No street parking / no parking on the grass). Plenty also don't allow any work to be done in view of the public so if you are going to work on your car you need a garage.
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My brother-in-law once simply opened his hood to check his oil level and the landlord pulled up like a swat team thinking he was working on his car.
If I had to live in a place like that I would seriously consider not owning a car. Bus service is hardly existant here except for the ski areas. But in places where that kind of thing is more prevalent so are bus routes. At $100 per month per adult that can be a lot cheaper than driving a car.
The main factor I think is income. If I made $10,000 per month, owning a car would be a no-brainer. When you're limited on what you can spend you have to direct it to what makes the most sense. A $2,000 apartment in a city with rules against owning an older vehicle would definitely mean no car for me unless there were better paying work there.