This used to be true when cars were reasonably priced, but these days when a base civic is 30 k, things needs to be re-evaluated.
I’d also say that car tech in general has advanced massively, so even a cheeseey car would be equivalent to top of the line of a car build in the early 2000s.
Most new cars these days are just loaded up with unnecessary bullshit, like touch screens, that’s driven the cost way up. Everything is fucking computer controlled and just prone to fail and be a nightmare to service.