thoughts on buying used cars

92tide

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May 9, 2000
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as the vw diesel saga continues it now looks like we will be doing the buyback option and getting another vehicle. we discovered a leak in the hatchback of our vw, so there is no way we are going to keep it. the amount we will be getting in the buyback program should be enough to cover the cost of a used 2014-2016 small suv/crossover (e.g. cr-v, rav 4). i probably won't go the private sale route so will be deciding on carmax/autonation/etc., vs certified pre-owned from a dealer. i also saw some info about carvana and since they have an atlanta location that would be a viable option for us, but i haven't heard much about them.

does anyone have any experiences with or thoughts about any of the above?
 

tidefanbeezer

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Sep 25, 2006
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I personally haven't bought from Carmax or Carvana, but I've had 2-3 friends buy from there. None of them were pleased with the experience. I will caveat this by saying that all of them just assumed that since the the car was at a dealership that it had been thoroughly vetted and inspected. Each one had mechanical issues.

The key point here: have any used car you are going to buy inspected by an independent mechanic before buying no matter who you purchase from. I've done that with several used vehicles and have been able to avoid a couple that had looming issues.
 

Jon

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yup, just went through this over the last few weeks as the wife's 10 year old and well paid off Benz was totaled in a low speed fender bender

I'll share what I've learned

Carvana is a really cool service that shows a lot of great info and has a strong selection of cars at great prices. When you dig beneath the covers you will find that 99% (of the ones I checked anyway) come out of New York, NJ, PA and CT. Seems the Auction prices are lowest in the NE, especially for 4 wheel drives so they buy them there, truck them here and mark them up for a nice profit. I didn't want to buy an off lease car that spent 2 years in Manhattan personally, you may differ. I keep my cars for forever so I'd rather have something that began it's life better. For that reason I wrote off Carvana even though the nerd in me really wanted to work with them.

Atlanta Luxury Motors, ALM, you will see all over cars.com and autotrader does the exact same thing. Follow the carfax closely a few of their cars are local but most are Northeast as well.

I ended up buying a Lexus at one of the local dealers on one of the last days of the year. From my perspective CPO is the way to go if you find a good CPO program like Lexus. Costs a few bucks more but for Lexus seems worth it. Comes with 2 year unlimited mileage warranty and the first 4 service visits which for me includes the 60K mile service. Some of the CPO Programs seemed like they were marketing only and didn't really offer much. Buick comes to mind as we were looking at the Enclave.

CarMax, to me, seems high priced and many of their cars came from the same Northeastern Auto Auctions. Seems there is a good bit of profit to be had buying low there and selling high here.

I'll also mention that Atlanta is really, really high priced. Expand your circle to Chattanooga, Charlotte and Birmingham and you will see decent price reductions. Get into South Florida and the prices really really drop significantly. I had a CPO Lexus in Palm Beach that I was trying to buy over email and have shipped back up. Dealer and I were back an forth on a price and someone local scooped it up while I was playing the "I'll wait on you to accept" game. Fortunately a near identical one showed up in Atlanta same day. I went to the dealer and made him an "I'll do this today for X" deal on 12/28 and he bit. I'm very happy with the new ride though I was hoping to go without a car payment for another year or two that I thought I had left in the benz. Oh well

good luck with it
 

crimsonaudio

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Echoing what Jon posted, make sure you really look at the carfax history (or, if the manufacturer makes the service history available via VIN, like Toyota does) - I'd avoid buying anything used from anywhere in the rust belt or north. I've had to deal with a NY state auto in the past, didn't think anything of it until it arrived - the undercarriage was really rusty. I'd pay extra to find something from the deep south or southwest if I were buying...
 

92tide

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If you are looking for a small crossover, checkout the Outback. I can't say enough nice things about it.
we have a lot of friends with outbacks who love them and that was our second choice when buying the volkswagen. right now we are looking at what we can get for the buyback amount we are getting and the outbacks are a little bit out of that range but honestly i haven't done in-depth research. we are considering whether or not we want to pitch in a few thousand and step up to outback, murano, etc or if we are just going to go with no out of pocket.

it is going to take a few months for the buy-back process so we have a while to figure out what we want. surprisingly enough, this is the first time i have ever bought a used car.
 

92tide

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Echoing what Jon posted, make sure you really look at the carfax history (or, if the manufacturer makes the service history available via VIN, like Toyota does) - I'd avoid buying anything used from anywhere in the rust belt or north. I've had to deal with a NY state auto in the past, didn't think anything of it until it arrived - the undercarriage was really rusty. I'd pay extra to find something from the deep south or southwest if I were buying...
when i listed my 98 tacoma, i had folks offer to buy it sight unseen once they found out it was a southern vehicle.
 

Jon

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the rogue is on our list to check out. what year did you get?

we plan on checking out the cr-v, rougue, rav-4 and cx-5
I rented a Hyundai Tucson in Maui for a week last year and it was pretty damn nice, it seems to be in that same size/price range as the cars you listed. Might want to look at it. And I'll echo Chanson on the Subaru's. They run forever, better than Toyota or Honda IMO but they are very very hard to find used and hold a premium price when available. I really like the look of the Crosstrek hybrids too. But then again I'm a bit odd and love station wagons. I still miss my Subaru GL Wagon from the 80's it was a great car
 

Jon

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something that I just recalled that I was aware of but didn't factor in early. GA recently changed it's laws and depending when you last bought you may not have yet noticed either. When you do your tag renewals you pay an Ad Velorum fee each time, under the old program, so your tag will cost $20 plus emissions of 20-25$ and then the Ad Velorum of a few hundred bucks. On the new model the AD-V is gone but it has been replaced with straight GA Sales tax so you will add 7% in tax to whatever deal you come up with but only pay the 40ish bucks a year for tags. Keep it in mind because there is no way around it. I ask dealers for out the door price to include all taxes and fee's when negotiating.

Also know that everything the dealer offers as an add-on is negotiable and often you can find the reality of their pricing with a quick google search. Some of the stuff is just ridiculous too. Lexus wanted ~$700 for an interior protection package that amounted to a $10 can of scotchgaurd sprayed on the carpets, same with undercoating/rustproofing. I don't blame them if people are stupid enough to buy them, caveat emptor and all that but i'm not doing it. I did something I never do and extended the warranty but paid ~75% of the asking price for the extension. I did it because we put a lot of miles on our main mommy mobile driving between here and FL and South Alabama, nearly 30K a year and the Lexus CPO Coverage is unlimited mileage and transferable I intend to keep this car a long, long time. The Benz had 175K miles on it I expect this one to clear 200K before I am done with it. Be nice to have it covered by a bumper to bumper warranty the whole time. The Benz needed a new tranny at 99K miles, that CPO Warranty ran out at 100K, saved me the $7K that it cost to repair. Since that happened the wife wouldn't be comfortable without the warranty, for the price I paid I am good with it too
 

92tide

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I rented a Hyundai Tucson in Maui for a week last year and it was pretty damn nice, it seems to be in that same size/price range as the cars you listed. Might want to look at it. And I'll echo Chanson on the Subaru's. They run forever, better than Toyota or Honda IMO but they are very very hard to find used and hold a premium price when available. I really like the look of the Crosstrek hybrids too. But then again I'm a bit odd and love station wagons. I still miss my Subaru GL Wagon from the 80's it was a great car
my step-mom has a hyundai santa fe and loves it, but that's a little bigger than we want. looks like the tuscon is in our range so ill check that out. i briefly looked at the crosstrek as i like the way they look, but the reviews were meh. if we decide to put up a little extra $, we will be going with the outback.

we briefly considered the lexus but at this point we are not wanting to even take on a small car payment and we honestly don't drive enough to enjoy it.
 

92tide

TideFans Legend
May 9, 2000
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East Point, Ga, USA
something that I just recalled that I was aware of but didn't factor in early. GA recently changed it's laws and depending when you last bought you may not have yet noticed either. When you do your tag renewals you pay an Ad Velorum fee each time, under the old program, so your tag will cost $20 plus emissions of 20-25$ and then the Ad Velorum of a few hundred bucks. On the new model the AD-V is gone but it has been replaced with straight GA Sales tax so you will add 7% in tax to whatever deal you come up with but only pay the 40ish bucks a year for tags. Keep it in mind because there is no way around it. I ask dealers for out the door price to include all taxes and fee's when negotiating.

Also know that everything the dealer offers as an add-on is negotiable and often you can find the reality of their pricing with a quick google search. Some of the stuff is just ridiculous too. Lexus wanted ~$700 for an interior protection package that amounted to a $10 can of scotchgaurd sprayed on the carpets, same with undercoating/rustproofing. I don't blame them if people are stupid enough to buy them, caveat emptor and all that but i'm not doing it. I did something I never do and extended the warranty but paid ~75% of the asking price for the extension. I did it because we put a lot of miles on our main mommy mobile driving between here and FL and South Alabama, nearly 30K a year and the Lexus CPO Coverage is unlimited mileage and transferable I intend to keep this car a long, long time. The Benz had 175K miles on it I expect this one to clear 200K before I am done with it. Be nice to have it covered by a bumper to bumper warranty the whole time. The Benz needed a new tranny at 99K miles, that CPO Warranty ran out at 100K, saved me the $7K that it cost to repair. Since that happened the wife wouldn't be comfortable without the warranty, for the price I paid I am good with it too
the good thing (at least i think it's a good thing) is we will be paying cash and i think we will have 2-3 vehicles we will be willing to get so walking off the lot will be an option.
 

Tidewater

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I would add one thing. My father bought a used car that had come from the northeast during the time of the flooding associated with the hurricane.
Once my father purchased it, the car literally collapsed. The frame gave way. On inspection, the sea salt water had rusted the frame through. The dealer, once he saw that, agreed to take the car back and refund my father's money.
The hurricane is receding in time now, so cars that got soaked in salt water are passing from the market, but it is something to watch out for with cars from NY-NJ.
 

jthomas666

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If you have a mechanic you trust, check with them--they sometimes have cars that they have claimed they they need to sell, or know someone looking to sell. My 03 Altima was starting to show it's age--AC hasn't worked in 3 years, some timing issues. I mentioned my my mechanic that I was looking for a good deal on a used car, and he connected me with another customer of his looking to sell a 1998 CRV. My mechanic had done all the maintenance over the years so I had a solid service history. Got it for $1100.
 

Jon

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my step-mom has a hyundai santa fe and loves it, but that's a little bigger than we want. looks like the tuscon is in our range so ill check that out. i briefly looked at the crosstrek as i like the way they look, but the reviews were meh. if we decide to put up a little extra $, we will be going with the outback.

we briefly considered the lexus but at this point we are not wanting to even take on a small car payment and we honestly don't drive enough to enjoy it.
I hear ya. I had the cash from the insurer on the benz and we've been putting away $$ for years, essentially making car payments to ourselves after paying off the other cars. I hate car payments too. I know the Lexus is a bit much but i've spoiled my wife with nice cars and once you do there is no turning back. Fortunately she hates jewelry, clothes, furniture and is cheap in all other respects. She hates shopping unless it is at a thrift store and really only wants a luxury car. Considering what my coworkers buy in jewelry and the credit card bills their wive's run up at the mall I consider myself lucky that all I have to do is buy a luxury car a decade to keep mine happy :) she came home the other day apologizing for spending $50 on jeans at a thrift store, was like 8 pairs
 

Jon

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I would add one thing. My father bought a used car that had come from the northeast during the time of the flooding associated with the hurricane.
Once my father purchased it, the car literally collapsed. The frame gave way. On inspection, the sea salt water had rusted the frame through. The dealer, once he saw that, agreed to take the car back and refund my father's money.
The hurricane is receding in time now, so cars that got soaked in salt water are passing from the market, but it is something to watch out for with cars from NY-NJ.
Louisiana too after this summer
 

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