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let's face it, once you put down the non-refundable deposit, the deal is done, pricing is done. there is no more negotiating.
you always want to work out your deal before you introduce money into it, ALWAYS!!!!
It is juts another car coming off the assembly line that has a limited number or color and option choices. It is not as if the buyer could customize it in some weird way that would make it difficult for the dealer to resell. The dealer really has no risk that requires a non-refundable deposit.
Is the car even a new car anymore, or is it a used car now?
If they don't sell the car to me, can they put the car in new inventory and sell it to someone else, or does it have to be sold as a used car?
If it is not a new car anymore, then new car financing is no longer available, right?
At what discounted price does it even warrant consideration to take delivery of the car that has been in the accident?
There are many more questions that could be asked, but lets start there. Please respond with your opinions. Thanks.
If they don't sell the car to me, can they put the car in new inventory and sell it to someone else, or does it have to be sold as a used car?
If it is not a new car anymore, then new car financing is no longer available, right?
At what discounted price does it even warrant consideration to take delivery of the car that has been in the accident?
There are many more questions that could be asked, but lets start there. Please respond with your opinions. Thanks."
Yes, it is new; it has never been regestered to an owner. Once repaired it can be sold as new. A reputable dealer would tell the new buyer about the repairs. A really good body shop can make the repair as good as new.
The financing & etc is the same.
A sideswipe can be fully repaired and should not have seriously damaged the structure of the vehicle. You might ask the dealer to throw in an extended warranty or something.
Personally, I would order a new vehicle, even though the other one is probably OK. It is just that I prefer to damage and repair my vehicles on my own! :surprise:
IMHO, i don't love a damaged and repaired car as much as a new one. There are some exceptions, like if it needed a new fender (that is an easy fix), but any major body work that required pulling, hammering, sanding, and/or repainting, no thanks!!!!
Wednesday AM I drove the 100 miles home on the highway and my MPG dropped to about 35. I found that with the cruise control on, the EV never kicked in, so I shut the c.c. off.
As soon as I got into town I filled the tank again so I could test city driving, and I now have 66.6 city miles on the car (not a lot, I know). My computer reads 30.1 MPG and avg speed of 19.7 MPH.
I live in AZ and it's very hot so the A/C is on all of the time. But I bought the car in AZ, and it was very hot for the first 31 miles of the car's life as well.
I have been actively trying to drive the car so that the battery will kick on but it seems to only be on when I have no gas applied and am just coasting or am stopped.
I just went out to the car, which is parked in my garage, and it's a comfy 80 or so degrees in there, to get the numbers for this post. When I turned the car on it was just battery as expected, but then after just 5 seconds or so, the gas engine kicked on. The A/C was off as I turn it off before I shut the car down. The radio may have been on.
Should the gas engine have turned on in that situation? I left the car in Park.
I did notice a warning light that is a yellow triangle with a black exclamtion point in it. I didn't take the time to look up what that means yet.
Any suggestions on how I can get better MPG out of this car? That was the only reason I switched to a Hybrid. And while 30 is better than the 22 I was getting, it was somehow getting 38 when I bought it, and nothing has changed except the title!
Any input would be greatly appreciated.
not sure what the warning light is
EV mode will only stay on up to 42 mph and last up to 2 miles.
i average about 35 mpg. i try to accelerate and keep it in EV mode up until about 15-20 mph, and then when the gas kicks in, i start to accelerate faster. seems to work well for me.
i think more than anything, you need to change your driving habits to maximize fuel economy. at least there are plenty of tools to show you how
No matter how slowly and smoothly I accelerate, the gas kicks in after just a few seconds. Are you saying you can keep the car in EV mode all of the way up to 42 mph? Even with the A/C on? Do you think the A/C makes a difference?
It is also a very heavy jerk when the gas kicks in. I can only get the car to about 8 mph before the gas kicks in. I feel like I should have talked to the dealership about this more before I left. And it's 135 miles away so I can't just stop in to chat with them.
Any suggestions on where to find the tools to show me how to change my habits?
It sounds like you are sort of hard on the gas pedal. If you ease up on the throttle, I'm sure you can run on EV a little bit longer.
A/C probably play a small part, but I've been running A/C the past few days and it's been pretty close.
The tools I am talking about is the Power meter gauge, and the MPG bar. If the Power Meter Gauge goes all the way down to the end of the Blue spectrum, chances are you are braking harder then what's most efficient (slow long braking is the best for regeneration). The MPG bar is good because you can see how much you are using at that time. I try to ease up to 15 mph, and then I accelerate a bit harder when the engine kicks in, and when I am up to speed, I try to ease up and just maintain my speed and the MPG bar usually is around 40 MPG when I am cruising.
Don't worry, there is definitely a learning curve, this is just what I observed (btw this is my first hybrid) so there are probably better ways of driving the car as well. Find out what works for you. I also log my miles/fuel purchases on fueleconomy.gov. My mpg range is 31-38.
This is my 2nd hybrid vehicle as I also have a 2006 Honda Civic which is not quite the same as the Altima hybrid. I have noticed that if you accelerate very slowly you can keep the car in the EV mode for up to 40 mph during city driving. This is not always practical as cars behind you are usually in a hurry. You can pulsate the gas pedal to obtain good mileage and maximize the EV mode. I am not saying stomp on the gas pedal but you can apply normal pressure to obtain speeds of say 25 to 45, then immediately release the pedal and the vehicle should immediately go into EV mode only (usually at 42mph and below, and with a good battery charge). Then you can use slight pressure to maintain the vehicle speed while staying in EV mode. There is really no reason why you cannot maintain 40 mph and be in EV mode for up to 2 miles especially if there is no hill or grade to the road. You should be able to do this with or without the air conditioning on. All of my driving thus far has been with the A/C on. You are basically going to have to train yourself how to drive this vehicle to maximize mileage.
I am still on my first tank of gas after driving 355 miles. I am averaging 38 mpg (30% city and 70% highway driving)and still have just over a half a tank of gas left. I expect to get up to and possibly exceed 700 miles per tank of gas. I have been able to drive up to 2.5 miles continuous in EV mode only (mostly on level roads and even very slight inclines). The key to this is being very easy on the gas pedal and if you have to speed up quicker then do apply normal or moderate gas pedal pressure, then consider a light foot with slight pulsating of the gas pedal. You also have to remember that since this is a CVT transmission then pulsating the gas pedal is actually better for gas mileage than that of a vehicle with a normal transmission.
I've seen posts here with people getting ones with the convienence package for $1500 below invoice, and have seen newspaper ads listing them for $1000+ under invoice. Is this just a high quote or is the technology package in demand to the point it changes the price?
I was told that this quote is also the same as the Costco quote if that matters. Cars Direct looks like its about 31100 for the same car which would be cheaper. What's the best deal people have been getting with this package?
What makes that really bad, is that you will not get the price premium back at resale. Nav systems and other electronic gadgets do not do well at resale time. People will still want them, but they do not want to pay much for it on a used car and some will be scared away by potential repair costs.
You pay the extra cost of the options, plus lose discounting you would otherwise be able to get. Double cost. Then you lose more at resale. Triple cost.
You pay thousands more when you buy and only get hundreds back at resale after driving the car a few years.
You have to really, really want it.
But they added on so many dealer mark-ups like wheel locks and pin striping and other nonsense that any advantage in pricing was lost. I was tired of shopping and I had driven 135 miles with the idea of leaving with a new car, so I did not get as good of a deal as I should have.
I am not sure this will help you at all in making your decision.
Good Luck with your move. I was in no hurry either. I got mine for $2,300 below MSRP. which puts it about $700 over retail
The dealer is starting to frustrate me. I've requested a loaner vehicle out of their used stock because I don't have a car right now. I happened to have sold my Jeep 2 days before my car was wrecked. They are only offering a loaner for 1 week. Why 1 week? If they can offer a loaner for 1 week, why not 2 weeks? Or whenever I take delivery of the car that I choose. So, now I'm having to pick which week is the most inconvenient week for me, and then maybe I'll get a loaner...It is their fault that the car was wrecked...ok maybe not, but its not mine. One of my friends told me that I should rent a car, hire a lawyer, and sue the dealer to recover the costs. That takes the game to a whole another level, and I really don't want to do that. I just want my freakin car! :mad:
I don't know if I will take delivery of the wrecked car. I'm going to go check it out, drive it, and see what they offer. If they offer something outstanding I will think about it, but if they offer something weak I will just wait. Plus, the longer it takes to fix the wrecked car the closer it gets to August, and the new car being here.
Did anyone get any information at a road service program?
Also, I have terrible AM radio reception. Anyone else having that problem?
If you would like, we could perhaps contact Boardwalk together for something like $500 over invoice. Maybe they would be willing to move on two cars as they do seem to have a lot of slow moving inventory. If I were them, I would want to get rid of these before the 2008s arrive.
Let me know if you are interested. marc_jiang@hotmail.com
Regards
but in general, toyota's > nissan in the sound dampening department
but nissan's are just so much more fun
One dealer I talked claimed to offer aftermarket leather, but another said that you CANNOT put aftermarket leather into Altimas, that Nissan does not recommend it and it will disable the side airbags. I personally think that they just want to sell you a $6k package--although at the moment they can't even do that! I can't find any of the normal companies (like Katzkin) that offer a leather interior package for 2007 Altimas. Is anyone aware of a company that offers this, or have they had aftermarket leather put in? If so, do they accommodate the airbags properly?
By the way, I just love my car!
P.S. I got 'talked into' adding some type of dealer alarm system on the car, with a built in cut off switch, and worry it was a rip off after the fact. Any opinions?
I have not had the leather installed yet and am going to call the company directly that does the work to see what they say about the airbag issue. I really wanted leather, but if it is a safety issue that will definately impact the re-sale value of the car, I will just tell them to give me my money back.
Will keep you all posted.
I have an embarrassing story to share, as sort of a warning to the rest of the NAH drivers. I went to the movies this weekend and I was running late. I parked the car, and grabbed my purse and got out, pushed the lock button on the door handle, heard 3 beeps which did seem odd, but I went on to the movie anyway. After the movie I went back to my car and I heard an engine running and looked to see if someone was sitting in the cars parked on either side of mine. Nope. It was my car running. I had forgotten to push the button to turn it off, and it sat in the parking lot running for 2 hours.
My MPG's for this gas tank went down quite a bit so the A/C must have been on as well.
And now I know what the car is telling me when it beeps 3 times!
One thing I did learn and did not know before buying the hybrid is that short trips result in really crappy gas mileage. Apparently the engine needs to heat up properly to obtain optimal gas mileage so my first 5-10 minutes of driving typically result in pretty low fuel economy.
It is supposed to let you drive several miles at street speeds on battery alone.
Sounds ideal for people who have very short commutes.
Just plug it in overnight for a short daily commute back and forth to work, train station or the park and ride lot. You would only use the gas motor if you need to take a long road trip at highway speeds or if you didn't plug it in to recharge.