Car shopping = anger and frustration.

Woody wrote: No. I walk into fires. This is better.

have you met Lesley yet?

Fueled by Caffeine wrote: Finding a good used car was tough enough when I was single or without kids. Now that I have two little ones and a 6 day a week job with the crackberry leash, I am screwed for time. So it's either new or a dealership used car. Ugh.

I feel ya, dawg.

my only experience with Carmax is when my buddy bought a 2009 accord from them and traded in his 2000 Contour SVT (silver over black, 130k miles, decently maintained but had a noisy front wheel bearing). they wholesaled it immediately, didn't bother fixing it to put on their front lot. so, at least the one near Baltimore MD, they don't berkeley around with cars that need work.

oh, poop, when you get tired of shopping, i'm super serial about $4k for my '03 mazda6, silver over black leather, 164k, V6/MT. the headliner is falling out of it and it needs tires.

Your experience is why I tried to paint my Cummins in as realistic a light as I could in my CL ad. My g/f complained she thought I was making the truck sound too bad, but I didn't want to give anyone even the slightest illusion the truck was anything but a project. The first guy who came to look at it recognized this, made me an acceptable offer and hopefully he's happy.

I loathe buying a car anymore. Too many of my recent purchases just weren't what I was led to believe either through intentional misrepresentation or ignorance on my part.

If you can go to 17k I know where a 2009 Jetta SportWagen TDI - Manual - $16,995 is

Buy something gently crashed at the insurance auction. Everything I and my kids have driven for the last 10 years has been salvage- Ive run through about 30 Neons, and a dozen or so Volvos. Sometimes you get bit, (I only break even on about 1 out of 10) but when the nose is knocked off, at least you know it was running well enough to hit somebody.

And if you claim you have no time for the repair, just remember that sleep is for the weak. Lots of time for rest in the grave.

Where can we find insurance auctions we can get in? I have always wanted to go to one.

Ian F wrote: I loathe buying a car anymore. Too many of my recent purchases just weren't what I was led to believe either through intentional misrepresentation or ignorance on my part.

Same here - I never had an issue finding a half-decent car in the UK for little money and in general it was fun going vehicle shopping. Yes, I bought a bunch of Lemons but once I was financially able to move into "reasonable price" territory, I had no issues finding something good.

Out here, I am getting massively tired of looking at overpriced heaps with obvious faults that need a ton of repairs but are clearly pristine examples in the minds of their owners/sellers. They get really upset when you point that out to them, too.

Heck, with the ix starting to develop a nice line in engine knocks when the engine is cold I'm getting to the point where I'm starting to seriously consider shopping new or at least CPO and bury the dream of another P-car.

poopshovel wrote: Well, "certain areas" are immediate "no go's" for me, but a TSX or Civic Si aren't exactly "Rich guy with big-tittied trophy wife who forgets to ask for the money" cars either, nah mean?

I bought a Protege 5 for a Niece last year from a rich family. It was their Daughters tasteful yet sportyish high school car. She went off to Yale or wherever so they offed it cheap. Great condition, all records, they were the second owners and had bought it from the Mazda dealer. It took two months to find, but it was the best deal we saw by far. Plenty of TSXs were bought and will be sold by people that fit my little workaround.

Dude, what the Hell? I thought ALL the sweet deals were in Atlanta?

+1 For CarMax. I've purchased there. Go check them out.

I do not know about other states.. here in NJ car lots are legally closed on sundays. This is the perfect day to walk around the lot and stake out the cars you want to look at monday.

Worked perfectly when I got my Volvo

mad_machine wrote: I do not know about other states.. here in NJ car lots are legally closed on sundays. This is the perfect day to walk around the lot and stake out the cars you want to look at monday. Worked perfectly when I got my Volvo

It's funny because all the manufacturer's want the dealers open on Sunday. "If you close on Sundays and Holidays, you lose 2 months business" (52 weeks x 1 day + 4th of July etc). You can tell the dealerships where the owner doesn't actually work the business. They're the ones open on Sunday.

Sunday has always been my favorite new car shopping day. I'd hate it if they were open Sundays.

Angry: Thanks dude. I'll keep that in mind.

I would consider carmax, but I can't justify the $3-$5k premium. Plus, anything with a stick is a needle in a haystack.

Streetwise: Harhar. You're talking to a guy who's built multiple challenge cars. My garage is directly under baby's bedroom. That idea's a non-starter.

If you are looking for a car that enthusiasts tend to own, and don't have to "have it this weekend" (that is the case sometimes), and are not squeamish about long distance money transactions, don't discount having a good car shipped to you. Cross country is about $1000, halfway $500. Just mentally add that to the cost of the car. To find a rust free example with full records (and someone here is sure to help and put eyes on it) and a passionate owner, to me it's worth the extra cost and hassle.

I would also love to see this board do a second classified section with a higher than $20xx cap. $5k or $10k would be awesome. $2013 is project car land, sub $10k is reliable DD territory, and I would much rather buy from this group than CL.

My last two cars were bought off of internet boards and shipped.

you know that $10-12k gets you a 2010-11 Forte SX 6-spd with less than 50k miles. Just sayin'....

Re: No time to fix the Integra up - If you like the car outside of the "It needs A, B, and C, and it's got 300k on it, but I have no time to deal with it", you could pay to have it dealt with. Have a decent indy shop freshen it all up for a few grand (timing belt, deal with any leaks, fresh ball joints / tie rods / axles / wheel bearings / brakes / etc), let the local body shop spend a few days with it getting everything straight and the same color, have a top shelf detailer go through the interior, and now you've got the car you like, with all of the issues resolved, for half of what you are planning to spend. On the one hand, yeah, you just dropped $5k on a 300k mile 20 year old Honda. On the other, now it's ready for it's next 300k and you have no surprises.

@Bobzilla: and nothin' says "big pimpin'" like a Kia.

dculberson wrote: @Bobzilla: and nothin' says "big pimpin'" like a Kia.

I merely mention it because the cars he's shopping (older TSX, Civic Si) are square in that car's demographics. It's a comfortable, roomy, fun to drive car with all the "doodads" (bluetooth, power stuff, Sat Radio etc) the other cars do, but you can get one still under warranty for the same price.

Now, if you have to be a brand shopper, then no, it's not the car for you.

I almost bought a Koup new......the local dealer wouldn't give me the time of day to call me back on a 6sp, so I've been happily debt free.....lol

Honestly, I thought the SX Koup was a better built car than the Civic.

From what I have sen, if you want to spend $3000 or less and get something crappy that we all know and love, go to Craigslist. if you want to spend 10k plus on something used for the family or the wife, go to Carmax. The prices I saw for minivans were only really 1k away from what I could reasonable expect to negotiate, and the salespeople are better (I negotiated for 3 hours of the Cruiser) and the buying experience is unmatched, way better and easier than anything else. I couldn't find any TSXs, but here:

http://www.carmax.com/enus/view-car/default.html?AVi=7&id=8962502&N=689+4294966708&Ne=2&D=90&zip=30301&sP=NA-12000&pD=0&pI=0&pT=400&pC=200&pB=0&No=0&Ep=homepage:homepage%20Features&Rp=R&PP=20&sV=List&CD=662+14+966+240+190+398+15+9&Q=e2b9ff78-6a12-46ae-8c87-4d50976100b8

http://www.carmax.com/enus/view-car/default.html?AVi=0&id=7948895&N=689+4294966708&Ne=2&D=90&zip=30301&sP=NA-12000&pD=0&pI=0&pT=400&pC=200&pB=0&No=0&Ep=homepage:homepage%20Features&Rp=R&PP=20&sV=List&CD=662+14+966+240+190+398+15+9&Q=e2b9ff78-6a12-46ae-8c87-4d50976100b8

http://www.carmax.com/enus/view-car/default.html?AVi=10&id=8937447&N=689+4294967097&Ne=2&D=90&zip=30301&sP=NA-12000&pD=0&pI=0&pT=400&pC=200&pB=0&No=0&Ep=homepage:homepage%20Features&Rp=R&PP=20&sV=List&CD=662+14+966+240+190+398+15+9&Q=e2b9ff78-6a12-46ae-8c87-4d50976100b8

http://www.carmax.com/enus/view-car/default.html?AVi=0&id=9208799&N=689+4294967097&Ne=2&D=90&zip=30301&sP=NA-12000&pD=0&pI=0&pT=400&pC=200&pB=0&No=0&Ep=homepage:homepage%20Features&Rp=R&PP=20&sV=List&CD=662+14+966+240+190+398+15+9&Q=e2b9ff78-6a12-46ae-8c87-4d50976100b8

http://www.carmax.com/enus/view-car/default.html?AVi=90&id=8763103&N=689&Ne=2+662&D=90&zip=30301&sP=NA-10000&pD=0&pI=0&pT=400&pC=200&pB=0&No=80&Ep=homepage:homepage%20Features&Rp=R&PP=20&sV=List&Us=14&CD=14+966+240+190+398+15+9&Q=e2b9ff78-6a12-46ae-8c87-4d50976100b8

DILYSI Dave wrote: Re: No time to fix the Integra up - If you like the car outside of the "It needs A, B, and C, and it's got 300k on it, but I have no time to deal with it", you could pay to have it dealt with. Have a decent indy shop freshen it all up for a few grand (timing belt, deal with any leaks, fresh ball joints / tie rods / axles / wheel bearings / brakes / etc), let the local body shop spend a few days with it getting everything straight and the same color, have a top shelf detailer go through the interior, and now you've got the car you like, with all of the issues resolved, for half of what you are planning to spend. On the one hand, yeah, you just dropped $5k on a 300k mile 20 year old Honda. On the other, now it's ready for it's next 300k and you have no surprises.

I've been pondering it. Trouble is, I don't really like the thing that much to begin with, and I'd like something a little more kid-friendly. I'm all about keeping my ass in the same seat for a million miles, assuming it's a car I really like. The integra is "meh" in pretty much every regard...though a turbo would fix most of that.

copy.