Imagine for a moment that you are a single mom of two young children. You load the kids into the Toyota Corolla OnRamp gave you two months ago, turn the key, and nothing happens. It could be a dead battery - this cold snap is hard on batteries. That’s the best case scenario, but would still cost you $150 to replace if it’s totally dead. If it’s the alternator, another common issue on older cars, you’re going to need closer to $800. But since you’ve only had the car for two months, you haven’t had time to build up your savings. Before the car, every extra penny went to Uber to get to work so wouldn’t lose your job (a VERY common scenario in our town). You now no longer need Uber, but you haven’t been able to save enough to cover this sudden, unexpected expense on top of rent, utilities, groceries, insurance, gas, and health care that seem to constantly increase. If you don’t get this car working, you’ll lose your job. So what can you do?
For so, so many people in that exact scenario, the answer would be to get a payday or title loan at an exorbitant (immoral) interest rate. But that loan is a poison pill. It will cost so much to repay that this mom will never be able to build up savings and get out of this hole. This is why OnRamp does something extravagant that, as far as we know of, no other vehicle charity in the United States* is doing: we gift a full year of free maintenance support to every vehicle recipient! Whether it’s a battery, alternator, tires, water pump… or even an entire engine replacement (yep, we’ve done that), we pay the whole bill for twelve months. This gives our clients MARGIN to build their savings so that in the future, they can cover necessary repairs and maintenance without having to turn to predatory lenders. Through our first 50 vehicle donations, we saw clients average savings grow from $40 when we met to over $800 at the end of twelve months. They graduate our program with savings and a well-maintained car, plus all the encouragement, resourcing, and prayer we can give over those twelve months.
Charlie at Christian Brothers College Station has probably helped fix over 100 OnRamp cars by now!
We firmly believe this ongoing maintenance is worth the cost… but it is a cost! Through the first 9 months of this year, OnRamp spent over $151,000 on maintenance, repairs, and tires for all of our clients, both preparing the vehicles to be donated and maintaining the vehicles after donation. That works out to over $16,000 a month we need to raise just to repair and maintain these vehicles so our clients stay on track towards their goals. This is where we need monthly donors! We need consistent donations to fuel our ongoing support of these hard-working, deserving clients. We currently receive approximately $6,000 per month in recurring donations, and would like to double this number before the end of the year. If you’re not yet a monthly donor, please consider this option to take your commitment to this ministry to the next level. If you are a recurring donor and are in a position to increase your monthly giving, we sure could use it! We promise to spend it wisely helping clients make significant progress towards self-sufficiency.
To give monthly, visit our GIVE page.
One final note: we owe a huge thanks to Christian Brothers Automotive and Discount Tire! If it were not for the discounts they offer us, we would have spent closer to $220,000 through the first nine months of 2023. Please thank these businesses whenever you happen to interact with them!
*There are two awesome exceptions: OnRampDFW we helped launch in Dallas and a new startup in Houston called 3in1MechanicalMinistries that we are partnering with.