The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Veteran quits job to fix people’s cars for free
Tamesha Rayes climbed behind the wheel of her 2011 Hyundai to drive her son to school one morning last spring, but her car wouldn’t start. A troubleshooter from her auto insurance company came out and told her she probably needed a new starter or alternator, which are both expensive to acquire and install. Her heart sank.
The single mom and Air Force National Guard veteran from Moore, Oklahoma, wasn’t working because she had returned to college to pursue a degree. “I didn’t have the money for an expensive car repair,” said Rayes, 39, who used her car to drive her son to school and herself to college classes.
Then a friend told Rayes about Hard Luck Automotive Services, a nonprofit car repair service started by Adam Ely and his wife, Toni Ely, in the Oklahoma City area. After Rayes called Adam Ely, he drove to her house the next morning with his toolbox, tinkered around under the hood for a bit and confirmed the car needed a new starter. “We’ll find you a good deal on a new one,” Rayes said he told her.
And then he told her this: He’d do the labor for no charge. The whole thing cost her $200.
“I could hardly believe it,” said Rayes.
When Ely then took her and her 9-year-old son, Tysen, out for ice cream, a new friendship was sealed. “I can’t say enough about what he did — he’s a blessing,” Rayes said. “Without him, I don’t know what I would have done.”
It’s something that Adam Ely hears often since deciding to repair cars for no charge. It started in 2017 when he noticed a car driven by his daughter’s friend was running poorly. “I said, ‘Hey, let’s get your car fixed,’ and she told me she’d like to, but it would cost $400 that she didn’t have,” recalled Ely, 40. “I told her I’d fix it for free and it ended up costing her $65 (for parts) instead of $400.”
That weekend, said Ely, he told his wife he’d like to help others whose cars were just a few miles away from a breakdown. She thought it was a great idea. After putting a notice on Facebook, they came up with the idea for Hard Luck Automotive. Toni Ely would focus on public relations and fundraising through T-shirt sales to pay for tools, gasoline and oil, while her husband would handle the repairs.
A former Army paratrooper and helicopter mechanic, Adam Ely developed asthma, hearing loss and post-traumatic stress syndrome in Afghanistan, where he served for four years. Since 2007, he has received federal financial assistance, which supplemented the paychecks he earned as a civilian aircraft mechanic. Because Toni is still working, too, they decided they would be able to get by financially if Adam left his job to focus on Hard Luck Auto.
“It made sense to us,” said Adam Ely, who taught himself to repair cars when he was younger. “It was obvious to me that people were in need of some help.”
“We feel fortunate,” Ely said. “Most families are just one car repair bill from catastrophe.”