Chronic Car Buyers Anonymous

graphicguy

Michaell said:

suydam said:

ab348 said:

suydam said:

ab348 said:

Michaell said:

On another note, I took the daughter's Sportage to the dealer today for its first service visit. The car will be one year old next week and has less than 6000 miles on it. Quote for an oil change and tire rotation was over $180! Thems luxury car prices, if you ask me.

Oil change alone at the dealer is probably at least $80. Tire rotation seems premature at that mileage.

Question: how do pronounce “Sportage”? Is it “sport-AJJ” or “SPORT-age”? Asking for a friend.

Are you in Canada or the US? Seems Canadians prefer the French pronunciation while we Americans go with SPORT-age.

Yes, I'm in Canada. The reason for asking is that the Motormouth couple out of Vancouver who do car reviews on YT always use both pronunciations and it drives me nuts. Being in a country where there are two official languages, one of them French, there is only one way to pronounce a word like that and I couldn't believe their explanation that US buyers call it "SPORT-age". But I guess it is true.

They also do it with "Mazda" and that I do not get at all.

To me, calling it Sport-AJJJE seems comically pretentious for what is a pretty utilitarian vehicle. Like when we say we shop at Tar-JJAY. It’s a silly name anyway as many car names are.

Question for the group - do you prefer made up model names or model names (especially for SUVs) of actual places? (Taos, Santa Fe, Tucson, Denali, etc)

I miss the "zoomed" model names of the past....like TEMPEST, FURY, GALAXIE, etc.

stickguy

I can Remember which is which better with real name. Lexus (and Acura if I didn’t have one) are real bad. GX, LX, no clue.

nyccarguy

That 2014 Avalon I posted the other day was gone as of last night.

corvette

The recall on the Ariya is done. They had to do the typical IT stuff of rebooting their equipment and using a different cable. Now I know why Ford pays something like 2.5 hours of labor for a reprogram when it usually only takes 30 minutes--sometimes it takes a lot longer!

There is more (very big) Nissan drama that I've been texting @nyccarguy about, but I'm not annoyed about it. I'll report back when I know more.

andres3

Michaell said:

The saga of mom's Sonata has come to a close.

With all the additions to my sisters fleet, it was time for the Sonata to find a new home. I'll admit that I've coveted it for some time now, but it just wasn't a practical fit into my automotive life --- too far away, and I really don't need another car in the household.

The good news is that it's staying in the family. I've purchased it from my sister and gifted it to my son. His 2018 Elantra GT has been giving him problems lately, and was in need of something more reliable. This was a good solution for everyone. The handoff was completed yesterday, where my sister and my son met in Orange County for some lunch and the transfer.

He's over the moon, because the Sonata has:

1. Working AC
2. Sunroof
3. Updated head unit with Apple CarPlay

Only 60,000 miles on it, and my sister had the oil changed, the tires rotated, and a full inspection completed, coming back with no issues.

The Elantra GT was sold to Carvana for a price about $1K more than CarMax offered.

How many miles were on the Elantra GT? Carvana offered a lot more than CarMax on the X3 m40i too!

corvette

Partial punch to report... I am the proud owner of a 2023 Nissan Ariya. I got a letter in the mail today with a significant rebate, if I purchase before the next payment is drafted in a few days.

Anyone care to guess how much my out the door price was (not including sales tax, I'll pay that when I register it in my name)? No cheating by looking at my Leasehackr post!

I'll provide a couple of clues to throw you off: MSRP was $49,300 and I've been leasing it with zero down for $179/month for the past 15 months.

Michaell

@andres3 said:
How many miles were on the Elantra GT? Carvana offered a lot more than CarMax on the X3 m40i too!

I just asked him - just over 61,000

Michaell

@corvette said:
Partial punch to report... I am the proud owner of a 2023 Nissan Ariya. I got a letter in the mail today with a significant rebate, if I purchase before the next payment is drafted in a few days.

Anyone care to guess how much my out the door price was (not including sales tax, I'll pay that when I register it in my name)? No cheating by looking at my Leasehackr post!

I'll provide a couple of clues to throw you off: MSRP was $49,300 and I've been leasing it with zero down for $179/month for the past 15 months.

$25k

kyfdx

$24,999

andres3

stickguy said:

Some Corolla variants. Ford EXP? Subaru SVX (that was an outlier!)

and the "hot hatches" (Colt turbo, GTI, Escort)

Saab made some... sort of.

nyccarguy

@corvette

I think that technically you should get a punch for buying out your leased car. It is after all a transaction. You'll have to pay sales tax too. What's the official ruling from the group. I think we went through this once before with @breld and a Passat (maybe?).

corvette

Looking at the punch list, I don't think his Passat got counted twice. Possibly because he leased it for the incentive with the intention (or was leaning strongly towards) buying it out? I'll do whatever the verdict is, though.

stickguy

I vote that a purchase after a lease counts. no different than turning it in at the end and buying a replacement.

explorerx4

That's sort of like a solo home run in baseball, It only scores 1 run but counts as a run and an rbi.

andres3

stickguy said:

I vote that a purchase after a lease counts. no different than turning it in at the end and buying a replacement.

I will have to be the contrarian. A punch (to me) is a car transaction, not a financial one. Counting a lease buyout for the exact same vehicle is like counting a car loan refinance on the exact same vehicle. Is a punch counting financial transactions, or car transactions??

suydam

I go with counting it. When I decided to buy out my Volt at the end of the lease, I went through the same process as when I leased it — checking out other vehicles to see if there was anything I liked better, looking up predicted reliability, etc.

qbrozen

I think buying a lease counts. It differs from a refi because you’d have to return the lease and get something else anyway.

qbrozen

@corvette said:
Partial punch to report... I am the proud owner of a 2023 Nissan Ariya. I got a letter in the mail today with a significant rebate, if I purchase before the next payment is drafted in a few days.

Anyone care to guess how much my out the door price was (not including sales tax, I'll pay that when I register it in my name)? No cheating by looking at my Leasehackr post!

I'll provide a couple of clues to throw you off: MSRP was $49,300 and I've been leasing it with zero down for $179/month for the past 15 months.

I’m thinking you got at least $12.5k off. I’m sure it was more for that deal. I can’t imagine you paid a whole lot down in principle. You would have had fees rolled in. Not sure how taxes work for you. Eh, how about $31k?

Oh, wait, are we talking before or after that “significant rebate?” I’m feeling like $5k?? That would take my guess to $26k. But that feels low, so I’ll go $26.8k.

xwesx

You guys are zeroing right in on that mid 20s mark!

I'll go high... how about $28,000?

nyccarguy

@explorerx4 said:
That's sort of like a solo home run in baseball, It only scores 1 run but counts as a run and an rbi.

juansolo

explorerx4

I have nothing against Soto. It was fun watching him last year.
He has had a great wingman behind him the last 2 years, probably the best years of his career.
Not worth the money he is being paid though.

28firefighter

I vote sub-$20k.

breld

In order to forego the opportunity to shop for a new EV, the buyout must be very low. 😀

Having said that, I also cheated and found his post on leasehackr, though I will say my initial thoughts were in line with the actual result.

ab348

Nissan just rolled out the new Leaf with significant increases in range and lots of tech. That might make it difficult for them to sell a gently used one coming off-lease. I’m guessing buying out the Ariya was really, really cheap.

stickguy

I would not mind having an EV. But I don't want one with that low of a range. Baby steps!

corvette

I was really hoping to include a Bob Barker "you've all overbid" meme, but @28firefighter did not and was closest to the actual buyout.

The rebate was for $10k, which put me at $21k and change to buy an AWD SUV with heated leather seats and 8,000 miles.

I will say that Nissan's timeframe for the offer was extremely short--it was only good until the next payment was due, which (I think) is Wednesday of next week. That immediately made me suspicious that it was a terrible deal, but I found out otherwise when I punched it into CarMax and Carvana. Carvana offered $23k and CarMax gave a range of $19 to $26k (they wanted to see the car).

NMAC was difficult to reach on the phone (too many menu options), but their online chat person confirmed the offer and got me the payoff within a few minutes. Oddly, they did not try to sell me any financing--it is also an option to buy out a lease through their dealer network, and perhaps the dealers demanded that they be the only ones allowed to solicit financing. I don't keep that kind of money in my checking account, but I have a HELOC, so I transferred money from that to checking and went to the bank to wire the money to NMAC. I also went to UPS and sent the odometer disclosure and a copy of the wire transfer confirmation via two day delivery.

Now, I wait for the title. They indicated there was a 15 day hold on personal checks and wire transfers, but not cashier's checks. Had I been thinking, I would have just gotten a cashier's check, since I was sending paperwork to NMAC anyway.

kyfdx

I was so close..

stickguy

so you paid $21K to own it outright, which seems like a very good deal, assuming you want to own it (though I suppose you could flip it, but will eat the DMV and sales tax costs so a lot lower profit potential).

Actually less than $21K, since you would have had to make the rest of the payments if you didn't buy it, but I assume that was not a huge amount at this point.

roadburner

So yesterday The ti wouldn't start; classic BMW battery failure mode- everything works but the solenoid won't even click. It also wouldn't take a charge from my BMW/CTEK charger. I checked my records and it looks like I bought the last battery in 2016, so I think I'm due for a new one. the BMW battery is backordered everywhere so I'm probably going to go with an AutoZone replacement; they worked just fine in the Clubman and Wrangler.

stickguy

9 years is a pretty good run on a battery. And guessing that a car that old has no issues with having to register the battery to the car!

xwesx

BEM (battery energy management, as they call it) is one of those answers to a question nobody asked.

So silly how many manufacturers are including that on their vehicles now. I take a lot of crap from the Audi community about the fact that I just disconnected the BEM connector on my Q7, and it doesn't second-guess the charging, instead running in a default mode (i.e., like all the rest of the vehicles in the world do it!). But, it has been five years since I did that, and the battery is still working just fine (as opposed to the vehicle having gone through three batteries in seven years prior to that).

xwesx

Wow, that's a surprisingly low price, @corvette ! Basically a no-brainer.

stickguy

interesting thing happened tonight. on the way back from dinner, my wife (completely unsolicited by anything I said) came out with a comment that maybe it was time for her to get something new. She actually drove someplace yesterday on her own (she babysits the granddaughter on Fridays now and I could not go this week). One annoyance with the RDX is that sometimes carplay is glitchy (not sure if it is an issue with the port on the phone). But she has no sense of direction so not having reliable navigation is not a good thing. So got her thinking, that maybe it was time to get something new because she has no tolerance for problems (and I know if the car died on her, I would be told to make it go away, pronto).

Her main criteria was that it was easy to get into (I think the discussion started when I made a comment about how nice a height the Maverick sat at, and easy to get in and out of). And that maybe something sporty (probably a bone thrown to me). Though she did keep some brand snob going, saying that she did not want to downgrade on features or quality. And that led to a discussion on how even in the last 6 years technology jump forward. She is really interested in stuff like wireless carplay, charging pads, and surround view cameras.

I might be looking after all. Will see what is out there, but I may have talked myself into the new splurge being a CUV that she can drive. But if it is nice enough, and roomy enough for our beach vacations, I might just go ahead and trade in the Maverick for a sports car and a utility trailer!

stickguy

xwesx said:

BEM (battery energy management, as they call it) is one of those answers to a question nobody asked.

So silly how many manufacturers are including that on their vehicles now. I take a lot of crap from the Audi community about the fact that I just disconnected the BEM connector on my Q7, and it doesn't second-guess the charging, instead running in a default mode (i.e., like all the rest of the vehicles in the world do it!). But, it has been five years since I did that, and the battery is still working just fine (as opposed to the vehicle having gone through three batteries in seven years prior to that).

that has been an issue with Mavericks. The BMS not being calibrated well, and the 12v batteries not charging enough so frequently the trucks go into deep sleep mode (to save charge).

corvette

@stickguy - my Maverick seems to have two sleep modes... after three days or so of inactivity, the interior lights don't turn on when you open the door, so I'm assuming some modules shut down. After about a week, you can't remote start it via the app and it appears disconnected from cellular. I think the prompt in the app is to "drive the vehicle" to fix it, but in reality, a key cycle resets it.

IIRC, the 12v battery is about 50% discharged after sitting for a week or two, with the interventions it does to try to shut things down. I just keep mine on a battery maintainer since I mostly drive the Ariya.

Michaell

stickguy said:

interesting thing happened tonight. on the way back from dinner, my wife (completely unsolicited by anything I said) came out with a comment that maybe it was time for her to get something new. She actually drove someplace yesterday on her own (she babysits the granddaughter on Fridays now and I could not go this week). One annoyance with the RDX is that sometimes carplay is glitchy (not sure if it is an issue with the port on the phone). But she has no sense of direction so not having reliable navigation is not a good thing. So got her thinking, that maybe it was time to get something new because she has no tolerance for problems (and I know if the car died on her, I would be told to make it go away, pronto).

Her main criteria was that it was easy to get into (I think the discussion started when I made a comment about how nice a height the Maverick sat at, and easy to get in and out of). And that maybe something sporty (probably a bone thrown to me). Though she did keep some brand snob going, saying that she did not want to downgrade on features or quality. And that led to a discussion on how even in the last 6 years technology jump forward. She is really interested in stuff like wireless carplay, charging pads, and surround view cameras.

I might be looking after all. Will see what is out there, but I may have talked myself into the new splurge being a CUV that she can drive. But if it is nice enough, and roomy enough for our beach vacations, I might just go ahead and trade in the Maverick for a sports car and a utility trailer!

I think you'd be surprised at the amount of technology on a loaded Kia or Hyundai these days. My daughter's Sportage is well and truly loaded, with surround view cameras, all the safety nannies, and on and on.

stickguy

that is the deep sleep. I never try to remote start, and don't ever use the app. But if mine sits for too long, it goes into conservation mode and the interior lights don't come on when you open the doors (very annoying at night) and the fobless entry does not work on the passenger side. The issue seems to be that the BMS never lets the battery charge up enough so there is not much cushion. And also some issues with the app keeping it awake too much, which is a bad combination.

If I end up keeping it much longer, I will probably swap out the lead acid (that I think it has) for a glass mat and have the BMW reset to take advantage of it.

roadburner

@stickguy said:
9 years is a pretty good run on a battery. And guessing that a car that old has no issues with having to register the battery to the car!

Correct, but it’s no big deal either way as I have a Foxwell scanner and the Carly app.

corvette

@roadburner - I just bought a battery tester off of Amazon to replace the Harbor Freight one I had. One of the clips on the HF one broke, and it still worked, but was annoying to use. The new one seems to have sturdier clips. The (new, thanks to a recall) 12v battery in the Maverick still tests above its spec.

corvette

The other back-of-the-napkin calculation I did on the Ariya was that a comparable (in terms of odometer miles) 2023 Leaf with the larger battery, which has a similar cruising range as my base-spec battery Ariya, was about $5k cheaper to buy. The Ariya is more than $5k more of a car than that. Not to mention, the pre-2026 Leafs effectively can't fast charge because there are so few working CHAdeMO stations.

suydam

stickguy said:

interesting thing happened tonight. on the way back from dinner, my wife (completely unsolicited by anything I said) came out with a comment that maybe it was time for her to get something new. She actually drove someplace yesterday on her own (she babysits the granddaughter on Fridays now and I could not go this week). One annoyance with the RDX is that sometimes carplay is glitchy (not sure if it is an issue with the port on the phone). But she has no sense of direction so not having reliable navigation is not a good thing. So got her thinking, that maybe it was time to get something new because she has no tolerance for problems (and I know if the car died on her, I would be told to make it go away, pronto).

Her main criteria was that it was easy to get into (I think the discussion started when I made a comment about how nice a height the Maverick sat at, and easy to get in and out of). And that maybe something sporty (probably a bone thrown to me). Though she did keep some brand snob going, saying that she did not want to downgrade on features or quality. And that led to a discussion on how even in the last 6 years technology jump forward. She is really interested in stuff like wireless carplay, charging pads, and surround view cameras.

I might be looking after all. Will see what is out there, but I may have talked myself into the new splurge being a CUV that she can drive. But if it is nice enough, and roomy enough for our beach vacations, I might just go ahead and trade in the Maverick for a sports car and a utility trailer!

I love your thinking and am looking forward to your “car journey” vicariously, since I got 2 vehicles last year and have no business looking for anything — except the Sportage lease has 2 years to run and . . .

roadburner

corvette said:

@roadburner - I just bought a battery tester off of Amazon to replace the Harbor Freight one I had. One of the clips on the HF one broke, and it still worked, but was annoying to use. The new one seems to have sturdier clips. The (new, thanks to a recall) 12v battery in the Maverick still tests above its spec.

I'm taking the battery to AZ to load test it.

oldfarmer50

stickguy said:

interesting thing happened tonight. on the way back from dinner, my wife (completely unsolicited by anything I said) came out with a comment that maybe it was time for her to get something new. She actually drove someplace yesterday on her own (she babysits the granddaughter on Fridays now and I could not go this week). One annoyance with the RDX is that sometimes carplay is glitchy (not sure if it is an issue with the port on the phone). But she has no sense of direction so not having reliable navigation is not a good thing. So got her thinking, that maybe it was time to get something new because she has no tolerance for problems (and I know if the car died on her, I would be told to make it go away, pronto).

Her main criteria was that it was easy to get into (I think the discussion started when I made a comment about how nice a height the Maverick sat at, and easy to get in and out of). And that maybe something sporty (probably a bone thrown to me). Though she did keep some brand snob going, saying that she did not want to downgrade on features or quality. And that led to a discussion on how even in the last 6 years technology jump forward. She is really interested in stuff like wireless carplay, charging pads, and surround view cameras.

I might be looking after all. Will see what is out there, but I may have talked myself into the new splurge being a CUV that she can drive. But if it is nice enough, and roomy enough for our beach vacations, I might just go ahead and trade in the Maverick for a sports car and a utility trailer!

Not to speak blasphemy on this board but don’t modern phones have better navigation apps on them than many cars?

kyfdx

oldfarmer50 said:

stickguy said:

interesting thing happened tonight. on the way back from dinner, my wife (completely unsolicited by anything I said) came out with a comment that maybe it was time for her to get something new. She actually drove someplace yesterday on her own (she babysits the granddaughter on Fridays now and I could not go this week). One annoyance with the RDX is that sometimes carplay is glitchy (not sure if it is an issue with the port on the phone). But she has no sense of direction so not having reliable navigation is not a good thing. So got her thinking, that maybe it was time to get something new because she has no tolerance for problems (and I know if the car died on her, I would be told to make it go away, pronto).

Her main criteria was that it was easy to get into (I think the discussion started when I made a comment about how nice a height the Maverick sat at, and easy to get in and out of). And that maybe something sporty (probably a bone thrown to me). Though she did keep some brand snob going, saying that she did not want to downgrade on features or quality. And that led to a discussion on how even in the last 6 years technology jump forward. She is really interested in stuff like wireless carplay, charging pads, and surround view cameras.

I might be looking after all. Will see what is out there, but I may have talked myself into the new splurge being a CUV that she can drive. But if it is nice enough, and roomy enough for our beach vacations, I might just go ahead and trade in the Maverick for a sports car and a utility trailer!

Not to speak blasphemy on this board but don’t modern phones have better navigation apps on them than many cars?

Carplay uses your iPhone's mapping, instead of the built-in NAV

Sandman6472

My iPhone works great getting me to places I've never been to before. And for our job, it's a requirement to have a phone with GPS. Sometimes, we have to go to three or four different places to drop of sold vehicles and one must know where to go as we get picked up in a certain order depending on where we're going. I know back in 2013, I waited two weeks before I bought my first smart phone just to make sure the job stuck. Now twelve years and numerous phones later, still use my navigation from time to time.

Sandman6472

I like all the modern tech on the GTI and sure was missing a lot in the 2015 Golf I had. Just the push button start is a joy as is the blind spot monitoring so I know that there's something next to me in the blind spot so I don't make a stupid move. Don't use the charging pad as much as I should but my phone is usually charged up to about 80% most of the time.

qbrozen

Dang. So I was actually dead on with my imaginary math that brought me to $31k. I would never have guessed a $10k additional incentive, though. That’s crazy. I can’t fathom why they would do that and miss out on the remaining interest. Oh well.

Holding on a wire transfer but not a bank check makes no sense. WT is the only thing that can’t be faked. With my purchases, WT was the only option to get the car shipped immediately.

suydam

oldfarmer50 said:

stickguy said:

interesting thing happened tonight. on the way back from dinner, my wife (completely unsolicited by anything I said) came out with a comment that maybe it was time for her to get something new. She actually drove someplace yesterday on her own (she babysits the granddaughter on Fridays now and I could not go this week). One annoyance with the RDX is that sometimes carplay is glitchy (not sure if it is an issue with the port on the phone). But she has no sense of direction so not having reliable navigation is not a good thing. So got her thinking, that maybe it was time to get something new because she has no tolerance for problems (and I know if the car died on her, I would be told to make it go away, pronto).

Her main criteria was that it was easy to get into (I think the discussion started when I made a comment about how nice a height the Maverick sat at, and easy to get in and out of). And that maybe something sporty (probably a bone thrown to me). Though she did keep some brand snob going, saying that she did not want to downgrade on features or quality. And that led to a discussion on how even in the last 6 years technology jump forward. She is really interested in stuff like wireless carplay, charging pads, and surround view cameras.

I might be looking after all. Will see what is out there, but I may have talked myself into the new splurge being a CUV that she can drive. But if it is nice enough, and roomy enough for our beach vacations, I might just go ahead and trade in the Maverick for a sports car and a utility trailer!

Not to speak blasphemy on this board but don’t modern phones have better navigation apps on them than many cars?

The new Chevy EVs use Google Maps.

roadburner

@oldfarmer50 said:
Not to speak blasphemy on this board but don’t modern phones have better navigation apps on them than many cars?

I do prefer CarPlay to the Wrangler’s navigation system, but I definitely prefer the C43’s navigation to CarPlay. It is easier to use and has several features I really like.

Michaell

The Subaru doesn't have CarPlay embedded into the head unit, and the factory nav hasn't been updated since we bought the car in 2015. Since our house was built in 2016, when we use it, it shows we are driving in an empty field in our development.

On the rare occasions I need to map a location, I just use the phone (in an approved mount, so it's not in my hands).