dude, thats my car
 

So a few months back my wife pulls her voodoo over me or something
and gets me to buy a NEW CAR (yeah im an idiot)
BONUS it was done inside city limits/ YAY SALES TAX
Then it turns out the economy tanked and its now worth NEW
almost fivegrand less them my current balance. :headshake .

But now when I get into arguments with my wife over other things
I KEEP BRING THIS UP> our parents told us to wait for the car.
WE WOULD BE IDIOTS FOR GETTING A NEW CAR.
should i trade it in for a different one and hope for a reduction or credit
or will i be forever upside down on this stupid
nicely made foreign hunk of metal and plastic.

I am really fine taking the bus and dont see why she clings to the damn thing.
I guess im to green or something, as i dont see why we need these death traps.
I wouldnt actually mind if it just went POOF! one day
except id probally have to pay them at this point to take it.
IDEAS? helpful suggestions to influence the misses?

pretty sure "THEY" are watching me
so paying someone to steal it is out of the question.

being upside down in your car is the american way.

trading it in in hopes of reducing your payment almost never works.

let's have some details.

what kind of a car is it specifically, and what do you owe......and did you buy gap insurance?

WTF do you care if some piece of paper says you're upside down? You still have it, you're still driving it. Just pretend you don't know what the "street value" of it is. Do you throw away all your clothes when the department store puts them on sale a few weeks later too?

awww snap

One of the useful things my dad taught me is to never buy a brand-new car unless you're into throwing away $5000 by driving a block.

That, and the inexplicable habit of trading in the almost-new car for another new car every couple of years, are two American habits I will never understand... it makes no financial sense whatsoever, it's inexplicable! Is it stupidity? Vanity? What is the appeal of purposefully losing money on that scale? Can anyone explain this?

I agree. I've always said "buy two years old and about 30k miles...it's already depreciated by driving it off the lot, but you didn't eat that money, and any problems have probably already been discovered." Actual words may vary. ;)

I haven't had a car payment since, like, 1995. I will again, soon, as my car has almost had it, but I'm looking at hondas about 2 years old.

if you are going to keep the car for 10 years+, then why not get exactly what you want and know that it's got no pre existing issues? if you're going to want a new one in 3, you should either pay cash for a used one or lease a new one if you have to have new.

My grandfather's philosophy was that every used car on the market is on the market because the previous owner thought there was something wrong with it and didn't want it any more. Why would you buy a car from someone when they don't want it any more?

I don't completely agree with his philosophy, but he has a good point. You just have to figure out what is "wrong" with the used car you are buying and if that "wrong" thing is something you can live with. But every used car has something "wrong" with it from the perspective of the previous owner.

That was the advice in Consumer's Reports way back when Mrs. Dar and I first got married. Buy new, run the wheels off it. It's worked pretty well for us so far.

I'd take LJ's advice on buying a car any day (unless he was selling it ... :cool:) ;).

I'm with dar. I prefer my cars to be virgins when I get 'em.

I don't think so: a lot of people just think they have to have the newest car on the market all the time. Keep up with the JOhanssens, or something.

My younger sis-in-law and I were talking about this, she's a "new car every three years" person and though I can see her perspective I think it's a waste of money. She does make the point that she is in her car a good amount of the time so she's going to make sure she's happy...but you can do the same thing with a one or two year old car. Between the two of them they have great income, so I guess it doesn't matter to them. Plus she's in sales (and hugely successful) and always gets good deals because she knows the game.

My Honda was 2 years/30k when I bought it, paid it off in 3 years, and had another 10 of good use. My current car is an always paid off clunker, and it didn't cost me an arm and a leg in depreciation.

It's the brand new cars you can't be sure of issues. Recall this, recall that...oops, we put the brakes on wrong, sorry we didn't notice before it shipped.

"but but...I look so GOOD in this car, and everyone is envious." ;)

I agree. I am 40 (in July) and only had three vehicles my whole life. The first I bought used. The last two were bought brand new at the dealership. I like the fact that it does not have any mileage on it and, if something is wrong with it, I have the whole factory warranty behind me.

Then again, I drive the living piss out of them. I had the last new vehicle I bought for 11 years and my current car for the last 9. I plan on getting a new vehicle next year because it is starting to nickle and dime me to death. My nickle and dime, I mean $1600 last year and $1000 this year. That's a hell of a down payment on a new car.

You can probably expect the car to cost you about $1500 on average a year in maintenance costs from now on. But $1500 a year for a car is a bargain. That's $125 a month. You can't get any new car for that kind of money. Buying a new car is about wanting that new car smell, not about good financial sense. It's virtually always better to keep an old car running than to buy a new one.

A LOT of newer used cars are on the market, especially at the dealer's lot, because the previous buyer couldn't afford the car payment anymore. Additionally, a lot of them are on the market because the previous owner is one of those "trade 'em in every three years" types. Then there are the cars that were leased for a couple of years. The only thing wrong with them from the previous owner's perspective is that they weren't "new enough" anymore.

Every car has something wrong with it, or will have something wrong with it... buying new is no guarantee that it won't need constant repairs. My neighbor's new car is in the shop more than my 20-year-old monster... plus my monster gets better gas mileage than most new cars.

Call me frugal, call me cheap, call me whatever... I just don't get the new car appeal. It seems like throwing away money.