Random Thoughts... [Automotive Edition]

Well , actually my thought ...

After being offered a company car for almost free (I have to pay only a small part of what it costs....) I'll take it.
But I certainly dont need three cars standing infront of my door.
My sis will get her licence in the beginning of may - so she'll get the Dacia. (hope she'll take it)
Than there is the problem with the Golf. Yesterday I was visiting some dealers to see some new cars and asked them for a quote for my Golf. UGH!
The Skoda-Dealer offered me 7500? , the VW one offered me the same. Our Audi-dealer isn't interested at all...

The new car will either be a Skoda Octavia or a VW Passat.

greetz
 
Sell it yourself. I was offered $100 for my trade-in because all the dealer would have been able to do with it was wholesale. Craigslist and 2 days later I pocketed $2k.
 
Dealers tend to make a ton on trade-ins.
 
Well, there was only one goot quote from a renault-dealer :
If I go on leasing for a new Renault (private) , they'd pay me roundabout 9000? for my Golf.

And if you ask me, the Twingo RS is a nice car :D
 
Actually, I think the new 3-door Megane looks pretty damn good, especially from the rear.

http://img42.imageshack.**/img42/4855/2010renaultmeganersrena.jpg
 
damn that does look fine. Yet another hothatch i will never see on the road here in the states. Also i bet the R26.R version (if when it comes) will look even sexier
 
thevictor390 said:
Sell it yourself. I was offered $100 for my trade-in because all the dealer would have been able to do with it was wholesale. Craigslist and 2 days later I pocketed $2k.
Click to expand...

Cheap cars like that are almost always better to sell on your own as long as you are ok investing a little time and don't mind people coming to your house.


GRtak said:
Dealers tend to ONLY make money a ton on trade-ins.
Click to expand...

FTFY

You can't make money on selling new cars and you can't really make very much money selling used cars bought off lease or at auction anymore. By the time you pay for transportation, fees and cleaning up a car bought from the manufacturer or at auction there isn't much gross left. The only way to make serious money any more is selling tradeins.

Just looking over my pay sheet for the last month with one exception the only cars I made real money on were cars we took in trade.

Average commission from cars that were traded in 750 dollars.

Average commission from new cars, used cars we bought direct from the manufacturer or used cars we bought from an auction/wholesaler 226 dollars.

That number is much higher then it would be because it includes one $80,000 car we bought from a wholesaler so there was a fair bit or markup in it. Normally it would be less then 200 bucks for the average of those three types of cars.
 
So I can understand people getting in fender benders, but then only having the money to fix the necessary bits like lights but not the bodywork, or not fix it at all if the damage is only cosmetic, but I do get at least a little bit terrified if i'm driving and I get near a car that is absolutely full of dents all over the place.


seriously, if you can't get your driving skills together enough to keep from constantly having accidents, start getting farmiliar with your local bus scheduals.
 
So...random thoughts...I rode in a PT Cruiser for the first time today. (Me and 3 friends were donating clothes to Goodwill as part of a class project) It was the refreshed base model but I was honestly shocked. Everyone made it out to be a really, really shit car. The doors all shut with a nice thud, the interior was pretty decent with armrests and door panels that had at least a tiny bit of soft touch coverings on them. Space was pretty good, with plenty of room to move and a nice seating position. Only interior downside I could pick up on was the lack of a release for the hatch inside, and perhaps you could see some mold lines on some parts. (gearknob and head rests) As far as the drive (err..ride ??) goes, the car was pretty quiet, accelerated well with a nice sound, and felt solid.

I don't know if my standards are artificially low due to driving the Saturn, but I'd buy one!
 
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And if you like the looks you can make a good case for getting one.
 
I felt the same about the Dodge Caliber when I drove one, I was prepared for a truly terrible car, as it was the general consensus on the car, but it was actually pretty decent.
The only thing that was truly horrid was the CVT box, but after being in a Suzuki SX4 equipped with a CVT as well, I think I just can't stand this kind of gearbox.
 
I drove a Chevy Cobalt when I was buying and it was perfectly fine. Nothing to write home about, but, it was acceptable as a car. I'm not sure there are any new cars that are truly terrible anymore, bland maybe....
 
I was recently in a Cobalt and I found it not bad, but not very good either. It wasn't as laughably bad as that Aveo I spoke about earlier last year. I still wouldn't buy one as they are terrible value for money, but they're not as bad as the Cavalier they replaced.

For that matter, my Mom has a PT Cruiser and it's just fine as a transport box. A lot of other people seem to agree on that, because it's one of the few cars that Chrysler makes that are still selling well - so well that Chrysler was supposed to discontinue it in favor of the terrible Caliber (its planned replacement) but hasn't due to the fact that people are still buying the thing in significant numbers. And they're avoiding the Caliber like it was the black plague.
 
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The thing is that when you get down to it our modern definition of a bad car is a average car.
 
I have to disagree, at least for me. There are some terrible classes of car, but there are good cars within those classes.
 
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