Lets not get carried away

I'm adding together the costs of sourcing, registering and insuring a vehicle (I'm estimating everything around a 2003 Troop Carrier)

$750 Stamp Duty
$750 P/A Australian comprehensive insurance with AAMI
International comprehensive insurance is a topic for another day.

I'm beginning to think about some accessories for the car that previously I would not have worried about.
The previous post of wish-list/must have list is starting to blur. It's becoming more of a 'It will need to eventually have' list.

Roof Rack
Yes - I avoided it this far, but EVERY overland traveller has one. I thought 'ahhh rubbish, they just carry too much junk'. My mind has been going in circles trying to figure out where to put Maxtrax, highlift jack, chairs, table, additional spare tyre, spare water, recovery gear & vehicle spares.
One huge drawer in our last trip was dedicated to vehicle repairs, fluids, tools. It would be nice to keep all this heavy equipment lower in the car to reduce the centre-of-gravity, but I suspect we're just going to have to live with it. Anything else that needs to stay dry and clean (like clothes, food) can pack nicely in the under bed section.

The choices are... ARB Steel roof rack, or ARB Aluminium roof rack. The aluminium being 40% lighter yet carrying the same payload. I suspect we will quickly see return on the additional cost in handling and fuel economy. One might accuse me of being biased to ARB gear, but I find it better value for money, sure its double the price, but lasts forever. "The poor man pays twice" as the saying goes.

The shipping agent is much more comfortable shipping the vehicle in a container for security, which typically adds a bit more to the cost, but means we can take what we need, rather than scramble to source things in a strange country. This includes the roof rack which was not an option with roll-on, roll-off shipping. We would have only made it by a few centimetres anyway.

Bull-bar
It's not one of those 'must have's but, they are a must have in order to mount a winch. They are handy for mounting antennas, lights and winches on. I've been fortunate to avoid damage so far, but I can see it saving us if we hit a bear, kangaroo etc.


Winch
Wow - that's a topic for another day - there is so many variants in speed, strength, size & cost.


So the sum of this post is I need to be ever conscious to not let the costs run away with us. There are substantial upfront costs, running costs, travel costs that we need to budget for, so we must not spend the whole budget on the car.