Another Car Payment
Rob’s adventure’s in finding a new car, from my perspective:
Given that it wouldn’t be my car, I just saw it all the way through as another car payment. What can we afford? What’s our out-the door price? It was not a visceral experience for me as Rob has described; it was a purely cognitive one based on finances.
I did, in the end, concede to paying a little bit more per month that I had originally quoted as our “magic number” but Rob has promised to eat PB & J for lunch for the next 6 years AND this little bit more is for a fabulous new car that we got an EXCELLENT deal on. So I’m happy. And I’m happy Rob’s happy b/c his crankiness was really trying my patience.
I also want to point out how taking delivery on the car was completely hassle-free. We went into the dealership for the first time knowing exactly what we wanted, exactly what we were going to pay for it, and how we were going to pay for it. There was no negotiating (that was already done via email) and no uncomfortable wait on the financing numbers (we had a loan with a great interest rate all ready in our back pockets). We had the upper hand, as it should be in the car buying process. Our salesman was frantically running around for us so we could take delivery that night as we sat quietly (well, *I* was quiet anyway) and drank the free water.
Here is my view of the car buying process: You are a consumer and you WANT to buy a car. They are the salespeople and the NEED to sell it. The good salespeople recognize this and cater to you. Bad salespeople ignore this and try to take advantage of you by saying things like”We’ll get MSRP for this vehicle” and “You want a stick shift? That’s really hard to come by.” Walk away (or hang up on these people). They do not deserve your time.
I am really proud of Rob for the following phone conversation with a salesman named Bob:
Rob: What is your best price for this vehicle?
Bob: (some outrageous number)
Rob: Well that would be why you still have it, wouldn’t it Bob? I have quotes from 2 other dealerships for (some number that is much more reasonable).
Bob: (Some number that is much more reasonable)??? How did they come up with that?
Rob: I’ll tell you how they came up with that. (Goes on to explain: invoice is $X0,000, minus the current rebate, minus some for just wanting my business.)
Bob: Well..uh (not really expecting an answer to his question b/c he thought Rob pulled his reasonable # out of his you know where)…sounds like you should take that deal then.
Rob: Yes, it sounds like I should Bob.
The sad thing is that Bob probably got his #. Don’t be that person.
Now that it’s all done, I can enjoy the fact that my husband has a fancy new car that supposedly has a lot of horsepower, AWD, and something called a “Sport Sharp” mode. And my favorite: heated seats.
