On a not-very-sunny Wednesday morning (considering I didn't have to work) my friend Randy and I went into South Jersey to look at Mazda, VolksWagen and Ford dealers all within a few blocks of each other. To be honest I didn't expect to be there for about five hours looking at cars and speaking with sales people. If you know me, I do not like salesmen...at all. They throw all these numbers at you, pretend to be your friend, feed you (I didn't get fed) and then make you sign all this paperwork. But luckily I turned down all three offers and made my own decision; thanks to Randy as well.
While the Mazda dealer was a little aggressive, VolksWagen brought out three different people and even ran out to offer us more random crap when we were driving away. The manager also spoke Spanish to us expecting us to feel more at ease. Sorry, that doesn't work with me. The Ford dealer was the nicest and less pushier of the three. His motto was if you're going to buy the car, you're going to buy it. And it's true. If we want something we're going to get it. Point blank. After a lunch break and some candy shopping I went with my top two: 2012 Mazda 3 and 2013 Ford Focus.So who did I go with? Well the top photo just says it all.
Now came the bad news. Since Hurricane Sandy closed down the entire world, the DMV wasn't able to process temporary tags. I had to wait one more day to actually drive off with the car. Luckily, the sales reps at Mazda were nice enough to pick me up from work the following day to go back to the dealer (it's 30 minutes away). Luckily I handled all the insurance information the previous night; thanks Geico! I signed a lot of paperwork, and then boom! Overall, the experience was tiring. But I am happy to have my own vehicle, awesome credit and now the ability to do a lot more.
3 comments:
It sounds like a tiring experience, having to spend 5 hours trying to find car in three different dealerships. But in the end, you found the car that you wanted, which made all the effort worth it. And I must say you have a good taste in cars. The 2012 Mazda 3 is a great car. It has the much-lauded SkyActiv technology that increases fuel efficiency and engine output.
OMG you got a car!!! 5 hours at 3 different places isn't a lot, imagine 5 hours in one place. Paperwork is daunting, but I hope you treated the sales guy nice, and are nice to the service guys (when you go in for the check ups), and read all your financing paperwork. I work in the auto industry and MOST companies are sharking it up right now because people with the credit just aren't there, and those that are are doing so much research before hand they think they know it all. Going in with the mentality that you're going to haggle down to the "best price" is a wrong mindset to go with, it puts them on the defensive and will make your experience horrible. As much as you hate sales guys, they gotta live too, and they're not all bad. Aww, Eric you're so grown now!
That's one hot-sexy Mazda you got there, Eric! Reminds me of this experience before when I was on a wild goose chase to get my own car. I had no money then, so I applied for a car loan. As it turns out, it’s actually easy to get one if you have good credit, and since I had a clean track record, the car loan got approved relatively quickly. It’s great that you had friends to help you out that time though! When I was working the papers for mine, I didn’t have anyone to help me with the arrangements.
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