I've never paid more than about 3.5k USD for a car. Not sure what the second hand market is like in America but in NZ and UK you can get great cars for a fraction of the cost of buying new.

In terms of maintenance, I've had some that were troublesome, and some that needed nothing, it's a bit of a lottery in that regard. Most common problems are solvable with a few hours on your back in the garage though.

Possibly most interesting is that the value decay has already taken place at this point. Eg: buy a car for 2k, sell it 5 years later for 1.5k, as opposed to buying it for 80k and selling it two years later for 40k