Leasing a car

No offense, but yes I did - single owner beforehand pretty much as glowing as possible to expect of a used car. All of them previous to this one (with similar experiences) through my damn brother, two of which he bought FOR ME as gifts. (And of which each he disclosed the issues with them each time - unlike this one that was completely glowing on the report they each did have issues - of course none of those issues became the chronic problems that later developed into real issues...)

Like my current problem of a stuck parking brake clearly wasn't an earlier issue, and not something that I've ever seen on a Carfax report. Of course this shitty area I live in right now with the most pollinating tree in history over top of my driveway likely has wreaked a bit more havoc on cars than usual - I know my air filters have been a yearly replacement cycle because of the damn thing.... I think at the old house the air filters outlasted the cars....

Yea a stuck parking brake on an automatic isn't really out of the ordinary.

Yearly with about 3k miles a year on the CAR air filters - the pollen is hellish - white car makes it obvious quickly.

And yea automatic which I know ain't too rare but its making braking occasionally 'lock' a bit even though its got ABS so shouldn't. Harrowing braking at times while getting it unlocked - fun times.

Never gonna sell me on staying with used, trust me - too many problems.

Oil change + checkup every 6 mos (I never hit even 2k most 6 month windows).

Changing air filters every 1kish.

Troll_sl said:

So I was going to lease... until this amazing person in the finance department at one of the dealerships called me up with a deal.

I'm buying a new car and it's well within my budget. Fuck yeah, those feels. I'm kind of stoked.

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If it's a long term, just make sure it's a low rate.

Troll_sl said:

It's 60 months at 7%. Not the lowest, I know. But I'll just get it refinanced in a year. Should be able to knock it down quite a bit.

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I know you said you have basically non-existent credit but have you at least tried to find other banks/credit unions to finance the car at a lower rate? Even with my stellar credit rating the GM dealer I bought my last truck from said the best they could do was 7.5%. I looked around and found a 2.99% loan and refinanced the very next day, that same credit union offers 1.99% rates now.

When I've been swapping them, it's been literally black like soot - like when it was "oh shit, why didn't you replace this yet!" level for home air filters when I used to have the fabric ones (I use metal filters now though inside). And yea, I fucked up earlier quoting yearly - been a busy couple months felt like a year since I had my last checkup on the car wasn't until the second post I bothered checking my records and realized time got away from me. (And note on the "black soot" it's the same consistency and color as the pollen turns on my car after a day or two baking in the sun - car looks filthy constantly if I don't get it a wash pretty much once a week with how the pollen is - it's just a really fucked up spot for pollen - and last time I had it in the shop the entire hood compartment (which I barely ever open, I switch air filters on my car and everything else is done in the shop) had so much of that crap caked on it that they claimed the first mechanic had to leave for the day because it was triggering his asthma from the fragments falling off... (and suggested getting detailing done on the car and specifically mentioning to clean the inside hood - which I did... and cost me more than I'd like to admit...)

Maybe I'm overreacting to how much I hate this property though - its just been plagued with problems since my parents gifted it to me... [First year the hurricane hit and I had about half of the trees fall, and they were on average twice the height of this two story home... none hit the house, but did demolish the shed w/ all it's contents, demolished the fence on three sides of the yard, etc - and insurance only wanted to pay out 60%... fun times...]

7% ? wtf? Really fkn amazing person in that finance department...

I just went car shopping today and it's just as much of a scummy and unpleasant experience as I remember. I really need to figure out what signals I'm sending that makes salespeople assume I'm a clueless retard. I was wanting to grind my face into my palm for pretty much that entire experience. I got subjected to every idiotic cliche you see in bad sitcoms.

I go into Toyota and get a sales guy in his mid-50s. He starts putting my information into the computer and I notice pretty quickly that he has no idea how to operate computers in general. He's using the 5 keystrokes/minute hunt and peck method to put everything in and it takes forever. We finally get that part done and I ask to drive a Prius as I want to see how hybrids drive in both full EV mode and in hybrid mode. He asks me what color I want to test drive, I think this is odd as that's really irrelevant, he insists that I should try out the one I'd want to buy. I'm like OK and go with a blue one, and of course he immediately comes back with, "Oh we just got that one in today, you want me to hold it for you? We'll sell by the end of the day for sure." Cue facepalm #1. Anyway, I get in the car and of course the battery has not been charged, (facepalm #2) so I can't actually try out EV mode because it's not available. I drive it for a couple miles anyway mainly just to humor the guy and ask some questions about where the efficiency comes from and the computer system. Of course, his electronic cluelessness also extends to the computer system of the car and he can't answer anything. "Does it have a USB port or do I need an adapter?" "Since you can't plug the car in, does it get most of the extra efficiency from the regenerative braking?" "Uhhhh....I'm not sure, I'll have to ask about that." So, yeah, facepalm #3.

I'm pretty convinced I'm not buying anything now, but I ask the guy to run my credit to make sure I can actually get the rate they advertised. I have pretty good credit but I want to be sure about it. He spends literally 20 minutes talking with the finance guy, I have no idea why it takes this long, but then he comes back with a rate that's $40/month more and more down than the rate I saw advertised on their own website. I ask him if it's costing me more because of my credit, because it's illegal for them to lie about that, and he says, "No, this is the best deal we have, in fact you won't find a better deal at any Toyota dealership in the state." I want to strangle this guy at this point but I just direct him to his dealership's own website where they're advertising the lower rate and he goes back to his finance people and makes me sit there for ANOTHER 20 minutes. He then comes back with a rate that's still $20/month higher than the advertised rate, and I tell him that I'm leaving and am going to try another dealership. "Are you sure? Those cars sell fast, I can't hold it for very long it'll be gone by the end of the day."

That was two hours ago. He has called my cell phone twice now offering me a lower rate (but still more than their advertisement) each time. I think I need a shower.

Depends on where you are in my experience - if you've got a strip with a ton of dealerships near each other, that's usually less likely (although not impossible - if the dealerships are all different tiers - Jag dealership in amongst lowend brands might still be scummy) from what I've seen. And was a lesson my father taught me early on, "Always make sure to go to a dealership that you can just say 'That sounds shitty, I'll talk to your competition next door'" and doesn't seem to have been wrong for me thusfar in getting treated "right".

Last time I went to buy a car I offered to let them check financing just for shits-and-giggles even though I had fully planned on going through my credit union where I had already gone and had been approved for 2.5%

They come at me with a "great rate" of 8%. I just laugh and say "no thanks, I can get better through my bank." They ask me how much, I tell them, they say hold on then came back again at 1.5%. Seriously?

Also when I car shop now, before I even test drive I give them a list of car salesmen cliches that will immediately get me to walk away. Refusing to give the keys back on my trade in, asking me how much I want my "monthly payment" to be rather than giving me the price of the car, telling me I don't qualify for their advertised rebate ("Oh, that is military only"), etc. Even after listing off like 10+ different tricks that I've told them I know about, and told them not to try on me, they still do almost every time. It is amazing. I really hate dealing with car salesmen.

I actually enjoyed my last car buying experience, because we happened to get this roughly 25 year old kid who was on his 2nd day on the job. He literally knew absolutely nothing about any of the cars, which was fine because I had done my research beforehand, I just wanted to actually drive one. Kid didn't try to tell me anything, wasn't pushy, didn't know any of the cliche car salesman tricks yet, etc. When chatting with him on the test drive, he had been working at McDonalds up until the previous week. He had no experience with anything car related.

Ended up buying the car from him the next day, and I told the dealership manager exactly why we bought from him, because he didn't try and BS and freely admitted when I asked him something and he didn't know the answer, he didn't try to make up some crap just to sell me the car. I appreciate honesty, even if that honesty is "I don't know"

opiate82_sl said:

asking me how much I want my "monthly payment" to be rather than giving me the price of the car

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I actually love when they do this because I tell them some absurdly low number AND tell them how long I want the life of the loan to be.

"You say the price is $500/mo? I want it for $420/mo on a 60 month loan"

Usually I know they are just going to go back and forth to their "manager" to "ask" if it's something they can do and they come back with slightly lower numbers each time. I just love watching them walk back and forth pretending they are actually doing something. I get a huge kick out of it.