My New (Used) Car Story

On the pain scale, buying a car from a dealer ranks between buying a house and severing a major tendon.

In some ways it was very simple: I went through my credit union's auto buying service (my third car this way), so there was no haggling over price. I came ready to pay cash. Goodness knows, the dealership was desperate to sell cars.

However, once they handed me over to the "finance manager" the total was over $4000 more than I expected. They had added the longest extended warranty they had, plus a couple thousand dollars of anti-theft services and devices. It took over an hour to convince them that I didn't want or need these things for an inexpensive used car.

They kept insisting that they were just trying to protect me and then they would lop $100 off. We went through this over and over again, but the price never got into the range I was prepared to pay. I suspected that the only way they were going to make any money on the deal was to sell me these extras, and I felt like a heel for holding my ground. Not.

To make a long story shorter, I convinced them, finally, that I wasn't going to budge, they drew up the forms, I spent a half hour signing and initialing, and I got my car.

And I really love my new (used) car.