It’s “Everything Week” on the Buick.
I had to replace a broken, leaking, power steering rack, some lower control arms, and do the brakes.
I shouldn’t have had to do the brakes since Car-X did them last year. They made it one month out of warranty and then warped really badly.
I’ve never had a rotor of any brand, from any shop, warp after a year.
I’m not going to use aftermarket brake parts anymore. I went up to the Buick dealer to do the brakes because Chevy was going to be insane, and they both use AC Delco pads and rotors.
The Buick dealer gave me pads and rotors with a 2 year warranty, twice as long as the Car-X warranty. And that covers as many miles as I drive the car. Even if I decided to drive 40,000 miles in two years, they’re covered.
Chevy wanted $675 just for the front axle and Buick did each axle for about $430.
That’s actually lower than what the guy quoted me over the phone. Instead of making me write in asking for the rebate, the dealer themselves applied for the parts rebate and gave it to me at the point of sale, so that was nice of them.
The car is running a lot better, but the last week has seen so much money roll out in car repairs that I’m just trying not to think about it too much.
The salesman told me I should buy a new Buick. I’d love to, except it could end up being the KIA all over again.
My ex got my KIA when we split up. I barely got to drive it a year and a half.
Things can break on any car, and they will break. Maybe while you still make payments.
The salesman was trying to get me to agree to a 72 month loan on something to get the payment down. But I shot back with “That only prolongs the agony and increases the interest and the risk that the car starts developing out-of-warranty problems while you still owe money on it.”
Older and a little wiser.
Once I told the guy I knew all of the dealership tricks, especially the finance room stuff where they play pea and shell games with you. It’s a battle of wills, really. Dark psychology. He started backing off. Looked for easier prey.
(He mentioned selling a new car to a guy who came in for wiper blades. Who goes to the dealership for wiper blades?)
Their job is to make everything you just agreed to with the salesman go away and a new number appear, and to wear you out until you sign something, which is more than you agreed to, and stretched out over years.
An extended warranty from a company in Chicago that never answers the phone? Sure.
A “paint protection” plan that costs $3,500 on a $20,000 commuter car? What is that? Oh it’s an extra $30 a month for 6 years. Don’t worry what it does. They say if you sit down with your keys in your pocket and puncture the seat, they’ll fix it. I said (when I was negotiating on my ex’s Ford) “John, don’t poke holes in the car with your keys.” turned around to the salesman, “I don’t think we need that.”
GAP insurance, you know. Because the stupid thing loses 15% of its “value” the minute they stick a plate on it for you even though it’s still new. So if you wreck it, your car insurance won’t pay off the loan. They’ve doubled the price of the GAP insurance vs. what your car insurance company would sell it for. Don’t worry. It’s financed. With interest.
The taxes and dealer “documentation” bullshit? It’s financed. Don’t worry about the government.
Some people never learn.
In 1991, my parents bought a 1992 Chevy Lumina from a salesman named David Cain at Mike Anderson Chevrolet, in Gas City, Indiana.
They had just signed the financing, and David came by to say “You know, you guys spent way too much money on that car.” The one HE just sold them.
They must have gotten cheated so bad that the salesman couldn’t even believe it.
Of course, the 1992 Lumina was around for a good long while. I sold it in 2005 and it was still running fine with hundreds of thousands of miles on it.
Every once in a while, you’d get a whiff of when I vomited in the back seat in 1996 on the way back from Virginia when I told my parents to pull over on the side of the road because I was going to be sick. They didn’t listen to me and eventually the entire contents of my stomach ended up filling the back seat. I think some even ended up on the ceiling.
Dad had to detail the car, but the smell never quite came out of it, not even almost a decade later. On those warm summer night commutes to work, I got to roll the windows down because I knew what that smell was.
But GM made cars better back then. It wouldn’t surprise me if someone STILL has that car and all that’s wrong with it is it’s rusty. Still getting a whiff of my vomit from 1996. Echoes of David Cain laughing his ass off from beyond the grave over how badly he just screwed my parents.
I can’t imagine my dad being cheated that badly.
I’m certain he made the mistake of bringing my mother along threatening or blackmailing him somehow to get the car, distracting him in the finance room while David Cain went to work on them packing in the extended warranties and the paint plan and the GAP. Telling them what a good interest rate they got, when they probably got whichever bank bribed the dealership the best.
So I amused myself by wasting the Buick salesman’s time.
I told him “You ever seen Westworld on HBO?”. He hadn’t. I said, “He goes into the bar/brothel and one of the women makes him an offer. He says “I don’t pay for it.” and she says, “Oh, you’re always paying for it. The difference is our price is on the wall.”
And that’s how car ownership is.
When you work out a deal involving a lot of moving parts and the finance room and the tricky salesman, and pretending to have to go ask his boss if he’s “allowed” to make you a “really good deal”….I mean, as theater goes, this is good, but you don’t know where the number will end up until the paperwork is in front of you and they’ve broken you down psychologically to where you sign it not considering what six years might bring.
Job loss? Maybe.
Divorce? Happens.
You got sick? They have a car hauler!
At least when I need a steering rack or a set of brakes I can get on the horn with all of the dealerships and garages and say “Give me your price on this.” and I know what it is.
One of the salesman’s arguments (he gave me his card) was Buick has a $23,500 crossover coming out in a few months and I should really consider it.
When I had the car in with Chevy last week for some other work, they gave me a 2022 Malibu. Which was really nice of them. It had….2,000 miles on the odometer.
I went to open the sunroof and it took the trim with it. I had to pack it back in with my hand going “Goddamn it. You press a button and the car destroys itself.”.
That’s how they’re making things now. I got out of the car and noticed that in the last year of being parked outside at the dealership, the sun beating down on the car has already started to cause the outer trim on the sunroof to bulge outwards too.
I’m sure whoever they sell this thing to won’t be amused in another year or two when it’s raining in their car.
But that’s not the dealership’s problem. It’s not the bank’s problem. It’s not the problem of the fake warranty you bought in Chicago that doesn’t answer the phone or wants to blame it on your or stick eBay shit on your car if they agree to pay for anything.
You agreed to it. You get to figure it out.
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