Daily drivers "worth buying" ?

We're almost in the same boat.

Our 2002 P/T only has 135,000 on the clock, but my wife's daily job requires her to do inner city driving in her personal vehicle (has increased 2-3x in the past year), and it's a manual trans.

It's super fun to drive, but it's wearing her left knee out.

It's been a good car, and we only paid $3500 with 54,000 miles on it.
Needed front wheel bearings, but since then just regular wear items (* see below).

We're considering simply getting a slightly newer ('06-'08 ) automatic P/T.

Keep in mind any 2.4L that's approaching 95,000 miles will need a $900 timing belt job.
(If you can't or don't want to do it yourself)

If you can find one that's had it done, you're ahead.
That's a selling point for ours and a bargaining chip for buying one.

I've seen a few locals fitting that criteria for between $2500 and $5000.
If we play the cards right, we could break even, or possibly come out ahead.