(I have to apologize this got a little long).
Saturday, we headed out to go car shopping. A little background may be in order. About a month ago now, I started having trouble with my car, a 1995 Saturn Wagon. Basically, 3rd gear was slipping. I took it to a mechanic who quoted me $2000-$2500 to fix the car. Blue book on the car in pristine condition was $1700. It didn’t make any sense for me to put $2000 into a car worth $1700. I got him to get it to the point it was drivable and just used it to get back and forth to work short term, until we could afford a new car.
The original plan that morning was to drop my wife’s car, a 2007 Mitsubishi Lancer, off at our mechanic to get some maintenance done while we went car shopping. That plan got derailed when the mechanic didn’t have the parts he needed. So we went back home and regrouped.
Next, we headed up to the our local Blockbuster store. My Bride had seen signs the store would be closing and selling off movies and games. We wanted to take Princess to get a new game for her DS, but when we got to Blockbuster all the store closing signs had been taken down. Apparently, corporate was reconsidering closing the store, and if they did close the games would go on sale on Monday at a 10% discount. Color me unimpressed. That was not the kind of deal we were looking for. We were thinking more like 50% to 75% off.
With those errands out of the way, we were ready to get to car shopping. I had gone on Autotrader.com and looked up vehicles in our price range. The first car I was interested in was a 2003 Honda Civic at Stokes Kia. We got there and the sales guy was really nice and respectful, not pushy at all. He told us that the car was having its fuel pump replaced, and it would not be ready for a test drive until Monday. The other Civic we had found was at Summerville Ford. Summerville Ford was quite a drive from where we were, so instead we headed over to Stokes Honda. I mean, who is more likely to have a used Honda, than a Honda dealership.
As an aside, my first car after I got married was a little gold Honda Civic. I loved that car and ran the wheels off it. I’ve been partial to the brand ever sense.
Our experience at Stokes Honda got off to a bad start. The sales guy was watching us, not 10 feel away, as we unloaded our kids from the car. We found it very unsettling, but we talked to guy anyway. We told him what we were looking for, either a sedan (more likely given our price range) or a van (not as likely but still worth asking). He asked what our budget was and we told him ‘around 7,000.’ His first tacit was to try to convince us to instead put the 7,000 down on a new car. I come from the Dave Ramsey/Larry Burkett school of thought.
“Debt is dumb. Cash is king and the paid off home mortgage has replaced the BMW as the status symbol of choice.” - Dave Ramsey
We had zero interest in a payment plan. He walked us over to his very nice looking 2007 Toyota Corolla. We asked him what they were asking for it and he told us, $9,500. Now I wasn’t a math major, but I don’t know how you get from ‘around $7,000’ to $9,500. I asked him if he would take $7,500 for the car. He said he might be able to do the high 8s, i.e. $8,900. Wow, you came off a whopping $600. Thanks, man, way to work with us. We told him flat out that was too much. He looked around a bit for another car, while I salivated over the new Honda Fit. I love love love that car, but I can’t afford it, yet.When he didn’t come up with anything else in our range, we left.
There were two more places I wanted to go, Hoover Jeep Chrysler Dodge, and Strom Altman Suzuki. Hoover was in West Ashley,and Strom Altman up near our house. We had been at this about 3 hours at this point and Little Man was getting cranky. We decided to put off Hoover until early evening since we were going to be in West Ashley for a meeting at our Church for lay staff. We headed toward Strom Altman with the idea that we would just see how the kids were holding up. Princess was still hot to buy a game for her DS or Wii. As we approached Strom Altman, Little Man was still fussy, but my Bride thought it might be best to get him out of the car seat for a bit as we walked around.
The car I had seen on Autotrader was a 2005 Suzuki Reno. The salesman was honest with us and told us that they had just replaced the head gasket on the car.This made somewhat leery, but I took Princess with me and we test drove it. It was a terrible test drive. It idled rough, and the shocks felt stiff. I turned around and brought it back. They had another Suzuki, a Forenza. It was basically the same car. The Reno was a hatchback, and the Forenza more of a sedan. After being unimpressed with the Reno, I didn’t want to mess with the Forenza. I actually wasn’t too high on Suzuki to begin with. These particular cars were actually made by a Daewoo/GM partnership. By this point, my Bride and Little Man were back in the Lancer. I basically told the salesman we were done. As we start to walk back, he asks if we would be interested in a minivan. There was no sticker on it, so I asked how much they were wanting for it. When he said $7,500, I decided to give it a look. It was a 2004 Honda Odyssey EXL with a ton of miles (145k), but it looked to be in good shape. I popped the hood and the engine looked clean. I decided we would give it a test drive, so I got my Bride and Little Man, and off we went.
It was a great test drive. The car was smooth, and very comfortable. My Bride said she didn’t feel like she was driving a big van, and liked the way it handled. We looked at the CarFax. It had had two owners and it seemed like the maintenance was kept up with pretty well. I checked Consumer Reports and the 04 Honda Odyessy was in their above average reliability and a Consumer Report Best Bet.
I checked the Kelly Blue Book and it was $10,440. Why were they asking $3000 less than Blue Book? We got back to the dealership, and I had them verify all the ancillary systems like the DVD worked, which they did. So I asked the guy point blank, why is it only $7,500? He pecked away on the computer and told me it was actually $10,990. Stop the train! I told him we couldn’t afford that, and bid him good day. He asked if we could do it at $7500. I told him we could talk about it at that price, so he made us an offer of $7500. My head was spinning at this point, and Little Man needed a change and to be fed. So we told them we would think about, and left. I headed them off at the pass by telling them, ‘if you sell it, you sell it.’ I wasn’t going to listen to that ploy.
It was just a situation of this might be a little ‘too good to be true’, and our head was spinning. We weren’t thinking clearly. Back at home, we got Little Man changed and fed and caught our breah enough to talked it over. For every pro there was a con and vice versa. It had high mileage, but it was a Honda and they typically hold up well. It gets lousy gas mileage, but it has the storage space my Bride has been sorely short on since Little Man arrived on the scene, and it would be nice to get something from Lowes and not fret the whole time about whether it is going to fit or not.
We were looking for a sign, or leading. That peace that comes when God lets you know He wants you to make a move, or that unsettled feeling from God telling us this wasn’t the move to make. What we were feeling was ambivalence, as if God was saying ‘buy the van, don’t buy the van, I don’t really care on this one.’ We went back and forth before ultimately deciding to buy the van. Now I will drive the Mitsubishi and my Bride will drive the van. Princess loves it, and wants us to take it everywhere.
We will look back in a year and think this was a wise decision or a poor one? That is something we will just have to wait and see.
p.s. We later found the Autotrader add for the van. It was listed on there at $8,750, still about $1200 more than we paid.
p.s. We did get Princess over to Gamestop to buy a game later that evening.
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