Anything acid should be washed off before it etches the paint. Dirt and grime that gets rubbed does not mix well with painted surfaces. Paint has been like that forever. Nothing new.

I'm one of those 'obsessed' with washing my cars. The 911 I only drive on the weekends in sunny weather and I wash it every weekend. There's a new product from Adams called CS3 which is a ceramic wash/detail/protection spray. You spray it on your dry car and simply wipe it off - I swear to God the best product I've ever used and I've been doing this for a while.
Now I do up to 3 dry washes before I do a 'normal' wash. I've a DI water system and a blow dryer in my garage - that's how nuts I am.

I use my car often (less so the last 6 months for obvious reasons) and I would wash every two weeks (roughly) followed by a no rinse cleaning if it was a little dirty. Currently washing about once a month. Per Pete's note, if you aren't careful you can do more damage by washing your car frequently. I have heard that you can cause some etching in your rims if you leave them dirty for too long though...at least that's what the internet told me.

I wash and wax my car twice a week. And take plenty of pictures too. Don't drive it much though because I am too busy washing and waxing. Haha...
Goodness. It is a frickin' car. Take it to a car wash if it looks filthy. In the winter, my dark blue car is covered with salt but the local car wash takes care of it for a few hours at least.

It may be just a car to some, but to me, it's the culmination of 35 years of hard work, saving, sacrificing, all to make my childhood dreams come true. No way am I going to wash it only when I can't see the paint anymore by taking through a car wash. But to each his own, can't argue with that. If you want to keep your car slick and shiny, maybe look at getting a ceramic coating. They're not a miracle solution. You still have to wash your car, but you'll find the dirt comes off much more easily and it's less work to keep it looking good. If you don't want to spend that much, then maybe spend an afternoon doing a good wash and applying one of the new ceramic waxes. They're not as long lasting as a professionally applied coating, but they will last quite a while and they do look good. For me, nothing beats rubbing down those curves with sudsy, soapy water and then waxing it up with a good wax.

my last car i washed it twice in 3 years lmao. i kept it inside a garage and only drove like 200-300 miles a year.

It seems to be good practice to wash off bug splat and bird poop - anything acidic. other than that, it's a car like any other. Wash it when it suits you - and just don't ask the internet for when and how often .

Glad to hear OP is like me...so I'm not crazy after all. I was feeling guilty too. I just bought my car 1.5 months ago, and washed it once. I do park it inside though, so no dust accumulation.And my car is silver, so it hides dirt really well I suppose. As far as I'm concern, more washing equal more scratches. The only time I do wash it ASAP is when I get bird droppings to minimize the etching.

Watch a couple of this guys videos and wash when you want.

https://www.ammonyc.com/

Thanks for the tip on CS3, just ordered some and excited to try it. I am a big fan and user of waterless washes. I probably do a good 3-4 waterless washes for every full wash. So convenient to spray on/wipe off in 30 min in my garage.

I have a brown 2004 cayenne diesel with almost 100,000 miles on it. It sits outside, two blocks from the ocean. Once in awhile it sees the car wash. It looks great. Porsche does nice paint.

Totally with you on the waterless wash. My car is garaged and Im in the same range of like 4 to 1 waterless. Thing about that approach is you need to be generous with the spray and light with the touch or your grinding the dirt into the paint, not unlike the dirty cloth pieces in the car wash. Being able to do a quick wipe down and have it clean and slick for me is the way to go. Let me add Im not a freak about the car or the paint, its just a car and will get dings and scratches. I know if I spend a little time keeping up on it with the waterless wash approach its saving me a big cleaning in the future.

My car is a weekend only car that will see nice weather days for 6-8 months a year when there is not snow and salt on the ground. After every drive before plugging in the battery tender, I take a quick walk around the car and look for bird droppings or bugs that are obvious. I will wipe those off, bugs typically being wiped off from the clear bra and not from the paint.

Then every month or so, I will give the car a wash. Sometimes it's weekly, but more often than not it is monthly.

While I really enjoy detailing, both from the therapeutic aspect and also buying and trying new products, I really do not enjoy actually washing cars. By detailing I mean focusing on the small details on the interior and cleaning those items, cleaning exhaust tips, the engine bay, or the parts of the engine bay we can at least access. Washing is a dirty process though where brake dust is going everywhere and I typically end up with quite a bit of water on me as well as on the car. I much prefer waterless wash products, however they just never give the same look as a full wash for whatever reason, they aren't quite as safe as a normal wash and also I end up with 10 dirty microfiber towels to do a waterless or rinesless wash. I hope there is more advanced technology that comes out though that allows these washes to become safer as that is what I truly enjoy. If I could do waterless washes, it would be after every drive or once a week.

Leaving it dirty won't harm your car so long as you don't rub against it. It's the bugs I'd be concerned about. Left-on bug guts can eat through part of your clearcoat and require wetsanding to correct.

Depends on how OCD you are about these type of things

For those using Adams CS3 and similar, a question: Do you end up with "spiderweb" scratches as a result? As time has gone on, I find those more annoying than dust or even real dirt after rain—and they seem to me to be directly connected to dragging stuff across paint. Thus, the only thing that ever goes across my paint is a (very sudsy) 100% cotton sponge, with the two sponges for the car's upper surfaces on the car getting their own bucket and nothing dragged across the paint for the drying process. So long as a detailer/dealer/etc doesn't add spiderweb scratches, I can go years without them.

Trick is getting dealers to actually mind your request not to wipe the car down. I've had mechanics wipe the rear bumper down, probably embarrassed by hand prints, etc. Well intentioned, but would have much preferred to get the car back with their oily/greasy handprints. Easy to deal with in my driveway…