Edmunds Members - Cars and Conversations (Archived)

oldfarmer50 · September 2016

jmonroe said:
@imidazol97 said:

All of us may know someone who has a get-out-of-jail free card because of a law enforcement relative or political position relative.

And Mrs. j used that card one time back in the late '80's.

I was out of town for a week and I usually called home after I got to where I was going to let her know that I was still alive so I called the first night after I got back from dinner. She tells me she got a ticket for driving down a street to get to our house that has a sign that says, "No Thru Traffic". They have this posted so that people don't cut through this street to avoid having to go to the light less than one block further down the main road and then make the turn there. Everybody was aware of this and I heard a lot of complaints from people saying, "it must be nice to have your own private street. I pay the same in taxes as they do but I don't have a posted street". I had commented several times that I thought it was a valid restriction because otherwise that street would literally be a highway for all of the cars that would travel it to get to the many streets from it just so they could avoid the light.

The reason Mrs. j got her ticket is because she could see road work on the main drag close to the light and saw cars backing up so she made the left turn to go down this restricted street. Sure enough a cop parked in the driveway of a house about 20 houses down this street pulls her over. She told the cop why she did it but he didn't care just said something like "that is not an excuse for making that turn". As she is telling me about it I can tell that she is furious. I told her to talk to my Mother whose next door neighbors were the parents of a lieutenant on the local force to see if that ticket could be disposed of. The son, who we had met a few times, called Mrs. j the next day to hear her side of the story first hand and after hearing it said, "the guy who gave you the ticket is usually a pretty reasonable officer but every now and then he gets a hair up his xxx and can be a totally different person. Don't worry about the ticket, I have it in my hand and it's going into the can when we hang up".

Like you said, all of us know someone and the higher up they are the better.

jmonroe

I feel bad, I don't know anybody. Whenever I got a ticket I paid it.

fintail · September 2016

That kind of stuff, along with arbitrary laws, helps breed a lot of contempt for the LEO community. The small percentage of bad ones spoil it for the resounding majority of good ones.

I don't know anyone either. This will probably sound bad, but at least locally, I'd probably have to really act poorly, or offend someone with a finger on the button, to be chased down. My general demographic can probably fly under the radar at least more than some.

fintail · September 2016

That cop should have received a month of unpaid leave. Too bad the most rabid union in the land would prevent anything even close.

imidazol97 said:

Same department stopped a high school student for flashing his headlights at the officer to remind the officer to dim his headlamps. The officer was driving with his brights on to induce people to flash him so he could stop them. The case was dismissed. Officer thought he had the law down pat. The Science Olympiad students were one of several on their way to work a haunt Halloween attraction that pays for Science Olympiad group at their school. One of the parents was an attorney. Case dismissed. No get-out-of-jail card: sort of a get-out-of-jail parent. LOL

berri · September 2016

Well, I suppose there may be another way to look at cops and tickets, an incremental accounting approach. You need so many cops for crime, event control, accidents and the like. However, those numbers vary each day, so you have to go for an average or midpoint. Since the police aren't busy every day or hour, you give them radar guns and traffic patrol hideouts so it can absorb some of the overhead. But it is still revenue.

Flat out violations, I don't have a problem. It is those tricks like artificial limits, hidden or obscured traffic signs with unexpected (or often unjustified) reasons, that bother me. Now Snake, take I-88 in rural western Illinois. There isn't much traffic on it usually, but often you see more cops running speed traps on it than on the much busier (and usually more speeders) I-80 some 20 miles south and essentially parallel. Why, because the Illinois State Police has a headquarters in the Sterling / Rock Falls area off of I-88. It has nothing to do with safety. It is a pure function of revenue and overheard absorption. If you have a headquarters that hasn't much to police but traffic on a low volume tollway, then it seems you have a headquarters that ought to just be eliminated to me.

verdugo · September 2016

stever said:
Not an option with this software afaik. And besides, it says right in the Membership Agreement that we welcome all points of view here. Just like in real life - everywhere but your own living room. And perhaps certain relatives...

But how about giving us, I don't know, an ignore feature? Only every single other forum has had it since I don't know how long. You guys should really talk to your vendor.

jmonroe · September 2016

oldfarmer50 said:

jmonroe said:
@imidazol97 said:

All of us may know someone who has a get-out-of-jail free card because of a law enforcement relative or political position relative.

And Mrs. j used that card one time back in the late '80's.

I was out of town for a week and I usually called home after I got to where I was going to let her know that I was still alive so I called the first night after I got back from dinner. She tells me she got a ticket for driving down a street to get to our house that has a sign that says, "No Thru Traffic". They have this posted so that people don't cut through this street to avoid having to go to the light less than one block further down the main road and then make the turn there. Everybody was aware of this and I heard a lot of complaints from people saying, "it must be nice to have your own private street. I pay the same in taxes as they do but I don't have a posted street". I had commented several times that I thought it was a valid restriction because otherwise that street would literally be a highway for all of the cars that would travel it to get to the many streets from it just so they could avoid the light.

The reason Mrs. j got her ticket is because she could see road work on the main drag close to the light and saw cars backing up so she made the left turn to go down this restricted street. Sure enough a cop parked in the driveway of a house about 20 houses down this street pulls her over. She told the cop why she did it but he didn't care just said something like "that is not an excuse for making that turn". As she is telling me about it I can tell that she is furious. I told her to talk to my Mother whose next door neighbors were the parents of a lieutenant on the local force to see if that ticket could be disposed of. The son, who we had met a few times, called Mrs. j the next day to hear her side of the story first hand and after hearing it said, "the guy who gave you the ticket is usually a pretty reasonable officer but every now and then he gets a hair up his xxx and can be a totally different person. Don't worry about the ticket, I have it in my hand and it's going into the can when we hang up".

Like you said, all of us know someone and the higher up they are the better.

jmonroe
I feel bad, I don't know anybody. Whenever I got a ticket I paid it.

I feel sorry for you and I'm kind of surprised since you drive a school bus.

Maybe you otta ask for a route to deliver brats that live in a more upscale neighborhood.

jmonroe

oldfarmer50 · September 2016

jmonroe said:

oldfarmer50 said:

jmonroe said:
@imidazol97 said:

All of us may know someone who has a get-out-of-jail free card because of a law enforcement relative or political position relative.

And Mrs. j used that card one time back in the late '80's.

I was out of town for a week and I usually called home after I got to where I was going to let her know that I was still alive so I called the first night after I got back from dinner. She tells me she got a ticket for driving down a street to get to our house that has a sign that says, "No Thru Traffic". They have this posted so that people don't cut through this street to avoid having to go to the light less than one block further down the main road and then make the turn there. Everybody was aware of this and I heard a lot of complaints from people saying, "it must be nice to have your own private street. I pay the same in taxes as they do but I don't have a posted street". I had commented several times that I thought it was a valid restriction because otherwise that street would literally be a highway for all of the cars that would travel it to get to the many streets from it just so they could avoid the light.

The reason Mrs. j got her ticket is because she could see road work on the main drag close to the light and saw cars backing up so she made the left turn to go down this restricted street. Sure enough a cop parked in the driveway of a house about 20 houses down this street pulls her over. She told the cop why she did it but he didn't care just said something like "that is not an excuse for making that turn". As she is telling me about it I can tell that she is furious. I told her to talk to my Mother whose next door neighbors were the parents of a lieutenant on the local force to see if that ticket could be disposed of. The son, who we had met a few times, called Mrs. j the next day to hear her side of the story first hand and after hearing it said, "the guy who gave you the ticket is usually a pretty reasonable officer but every now and then he gets a hair up his xxx and can be a totally different person. Don't worry about the ticket, I have it in my hand and it's going into the can when we hang up".

Like you said, all of us know someone and the higher up they are the better.

jmonroe
I feel bad, I don't know anybody. Whenever I got a ticket I paid it.

I feel sorry for you and I'm kind of surprised since you drive a school bus.

Maybe you otta ask for a route to deliver brats that live in a more upscale neighborhood.

jmonroe

I work with a couple of ex cops but since I haven't had a ticket in the last three decades i don't know if they would do me any good.

As to the upscale neighborhoods forget that. You rich people look down on us bus drivers as just another of their servants. Even their kids figure we're just part of the little people.

I once had a rich kid tell me "my mom's a lawyer and she could have your job".

I asked him if he thought his mom could afford the pay cut. That shut him up.

graphicguy · September 2016

oldfarmer50 said:

jmonroe said:

oldfarmer50 said:

jmonroe said:
@imidazol97 said:

All of us may know someone who has a get-out-of-jail free card because of a law enforcement relative or political position relative.

And Mrs. j used that card one time back in the late '80's.

I was out of town for a week and I usually called home after I got to where I was going to let her know that I was still alive so I called the first night after I got back from dinner. She tells me she got a ticket for driving down a street to get to our house that has a sign that says, "No Thru Traffic". They have this posted so that people don't cut through this street to avoid having to go to the light less than one block further down the main road and then make the turn there. Everybody was aware of this and I heard a lot of complaints from people saying, "it must be nice to have your own private street. I pay the same in taxes as they do but I don't have a posted street". I had commented several times that I thought it was a valid restriction because otherwise that street would literally be a highway for all of the cars that would travel it to get to the many streets from it just so they could avoid the light.

The reason Mrs. j got her ticket is because she could see road work on the main drag close to the light and saw cars backing up so she made the left turn to go down this restricted street. Sure enough a cop parked in the driveway of a house about 20 houses down this street pulls her over. She told the cop why she did it but he didn't care just said something like "that is not an excuse for making that turn". As she is telling me about it I can tell that she is furious. I told her to talk to my Mother whose next door neighbors were the parents of a lieutenant on the local force to see if that ticket could be disposed of. The son, who we had met a few times, called Mrs. j the next day to hear her side of the story first hand and after hearing it said, "the guy who gave you the ticket is usually a pretty reasonable officer but every now and then he gets a hair up his xxx and can be a totally different person. Don't worry about the ticket, I have it in my hand and it's going into the can when we hang up".

Like you said, all of us know someone and the higher up they are the better.

jmonroe
I feel bad, I don't know anybody. Whenever I got a ticket I paid it.

I feel sorry for you and I'm kind of surprised since you drive a school bus.

Maybe you otta ask for a route to deliver brats that live in a more upscale neighborhood.

jmonroe
I work with a couple of ex cops but since I haven't had a ticket in the last three decades i don't know if they would do me any good.

As to the upscale neighborhoods forget that. You rich people look down on us bus drivers as just another of their servants. Even their kids figure we're just part of the little people.

I once had a rich kid tell me "my mom's a lawyer and she could have your job".

I asked him if he thought his mom could afford the pay cut. That shut him up.

Should have told him to "go fetch your shine box"!

ab348 · September 2016

verdugo said:

stever said:
Not an option with this software afaik. And besides, it says right in the Membership Agreement that we welcome all points of view here. Just like in real life - everywhere but your own living room. And perhaps certain relatives...
But how about giving us, I don't know, an ignore feature? Only every single other forum has had it since I don't know how long. You guys should really talk to your vendor.

+1. Especially since a plug-in seems to already exist:

https://vanillaforums.org/addon/ignore-plugin

bwia · September 2016

How to Close the sale when the customer objects that the payment is too high. I thought I'd share this short training video that appears to be quite effective, and probably more so if the vehicle has a high residual value.

From that perspective, it makes leasing very expensive by comparison and thus the old saying -- leasing is for suckers. Enjoy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vO9APD0yc1U

snakeweasel · September 2016

fintail said:
When the brave ones who set and enforce speed limits can justify the numbers, then we can talk about the morality of observing them.

The flip side of that is that those who think the speed limits are wrong need to justify why they are wrong.

If you think they are wrong give a valid reason why then work to change it.

snakeweasel · September 2016

berri said:
Speeding is an easy court case - just submit the radar record. Those other areas can involve more judgement and lead to more litigation time pulling the officers from the radar guns. I believe in Finance, that is called turnover

Yes you can just submit the radar record but to defend against it you can demand the calibration records of the gun and the certification of the officer using the gun at the time.

snakeweasel · September 2016

andres3 said:
Fighter jets are allowed radar jammers, why not cars?

Because it is a violation of federal law to interfere with the transmission and reception of radio signals.

Fighter jets are only allowed to use their radar jammers in combat situations against the enemy.

jmonroe · September 2016

bwia said:
How to Close the sale when the customer objects that the payment is too high. I thought I'd share this short training video that appears to be quite effective, and probably more so if the vehicle has a high residual value.

From that perspective, it makes leasing very expensive by comparison and thus the old saying -- leasing is for suckers. Enjoy!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vO9APD0yc1U

I gave this post an LOL because that is what I figure a car salesman would say. The games at the table never seem to stop even when the customer has more info now than ever to combat these tactics.

Like we have always said, "show me a payment buyer and I'll show you a customer that is about to be screwed".

This video proves that. And the most comical part of the video is the clown sitting next to him just nodding and eating it up.

jmonroe

snakeweasel · September 2016

imidazol97 said:

Just think how many of those could be laid off or moved to a productive position if the unnecessary tickets were abolished.

However, I am in favor of enforcing the laws, equally, for everyone. I like to notice the speeds the policemen drive on duty as well as off duty on the same roads where they give out tickets. For quite a while, the obnoxious speeders and tailgaters around this area had the little FOP metal badges on their rear license plate. And they drove like bats out of hill often in ego cars.

All of us may know someone who has a get-out-of-jail free card because of a law enforcement relative or political position relative.

However, I am in favor of stern enforcement of speed limits on the part of the obnoxious folks. Arch examples are those who treat the high speed lane as their personal diamond lane and expect anyone else to be out of that lane before they speed up on their rears. IOW, the "little people" should follow the laws and be in "their" lanes crowded as they may be, to allow the special folks to flagrantly speed past in lane #4 of 4 on I75 south, e.g..

Are you saying that we should have laws but not enforce them?

I agree that it should be equally enforced but not to enforce them simply because some think they are unnecessary is wrong.

Also note that in most cases in minor traffic offenses it is the officers discretion if they write a ticket.

fintail · September 2016

Work to change it, LOLOLOLOL, it took virtually a generation to overturn the dopey 55 mandate that the law and order hypocrites embraced like it was gospel. Good luck. One almost has to go the FOIA route to get the rulemakers to show how they determine limits on specific roads, or how they manage traffic controls. Work to change it - not my job. The people making the claims need to be able to document and defend their claims when asked. And who determines what is a "valid" reason? LOLOLOLOL funny. They need to put up or shut up.

snakeweasel said:

fintail said:
When the brave ones who set and enforce speed limits can justify the numbers, then we can talk about the morality of observing them.
The flip side of that is that those who think the speed limits are wrong need to justify why they are wrong.

If you think they are wrong give a valid reason why then work to change it.

fintail · September 2016

Maybe, but I don't know if paying cash for a brand new quickly depreciating item is any less sucker-ly, unless one is planning on keeping it for a decade or more. It all depends on the car.

bwia said:
How to Close the sale when the customer objects that the payment is too high. I thought I'd share this short training video that appears to be quite effective, and probably more so if the vehicle has a high residual value.

From that perspective, it makes leasing very expensive by comparison and thus the old saying -- leasing is for suckers. Enjoy!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vO9APD0yc1U

stever · September 2016

ab348 said:

verdugo said:

stever said:
Not an option with this software afaik. And besides, it says right in the Membership Agreement that we welcome all points of view here. Just like in real life - everywhere but your own living room. And perhaps certain relatives...
But how about giving us, I don't know, an ignore feature? Only every single other forum has had it since I don't know how long. You guys should really talk to your vendor.
+1. Especially since a plug-in seems to already exist:

https://vanillaforums.org/addon/ignore-plugin

We don't use the open source version of Vanilla (we pay Vanilla for hosting us via vanilla.com, not their dot org site) so a lot of those plug-ins aren't something we can switch on from our Dashboard and a lot of them wouldn't work anyway. Our list of available plug-ins doesn't include an Ignore feature (that I can find) so we'd have to get Vanilla to switch it on in the back end. All that said we are looking at some tweaks, options and upgrades, hopefully in this quarter.

henryn · September 2016

Last night I was very happy with the brakes on my Passat. I was driving along a busy surface street, 4 lanes, divided with an esplanade. About 8:30, full dark, but good street lighting, businesses all along the street on both sides.

A fair bit of traffic, but not congested, cars spaced and moving at about 30 mph. I was in the right hand lane, as I was going to make a right turn at the next light. Some idiot sitting at the stop sign on a side street, decides to pull out in front of me. I mean, directly in front of me. Very luckily, I was looking right at him, saw what he was doing as soon as he started doing it, and hit the brakes very hard. The Passat stopped with about 2 feet to spare, very, very close thing.

If I had been looking down at the radio, or thinking about work, or any of a hundred different things, I would have hit him square in the driver’s door at 30 mph. If I had been driving my truck, I would have hit him, the truck is new (5k miles), so perfect brakes, but a pickup truck, any half ton pickup, cannot stop as quickly as the Passat did.

henryn · September 2016

bwia said:
How to Close the sale when the customer objects that the payment is too high. I thought I'd share this short training video that appears to be quite effective, and probably more so if the vehicle has a high residual value.

From that perspective, it makes leasing very expensive by comparison and thus the old saying -- leasing is for suckers. Enjoy!

Did you catch the part where he talked about actual customers watching his youtube video and making nasty comments?

People hate car salesmen. As a rule, I don't. I dislike pushy salesmen, and I really dislike anyone who lies to me, but I don't mind someone who is just honestly trying to make a living. This guy (in the video), is a "closer", not a "salesman".

I purchased my last 2 new trucks (2013 and 2015) from the same salesman. I went back the second time and specifically talked to him. He is knowledgeable about what he's selling, and just one of those naturally friendly people whom it is easy to have a conversation with.

These days, the biggest crooks are in the F&I office.

I'm not going to weigh in on the buy versus lease, except to say here in Texas, having to pay sales tax on the entire purchase price up front makes leasing a moot question. To me, anyway.

explorerx4 · September 2016

Really enjoyed that video. Of curse you could always come back at him saying @$500 a month instead of $600, your net payment would b $144 in stead of $244.:)

@henryn,
If you had been driving your truck, maybe that person would not have pulled out in front of you .
That was one of the reasons I got rid of my Focus. Can't count the number of times someone looked right at me, and pulled out in front of because their vehicle was bigger.

henryn · September 2016

Thinking about leasing versus buying, I do have a question. I know there are a lot of people here who have actually worked in the automobile business, so…

Why do manufacturers put up big incentives on leases, that they don’t offer for people who are buying? I fail to see the logic behind that.

An example, right now, on a 2016 Passat, VW is offering $2,500 if and only if you lease. If you buy it, you do not get the $2,500. I have seen this on other makes and models, but the amount involved is usually not that big, most often in the neighborhood of $1k, not $2.5k.

This constitutes a very powerful incentive to lease, so obviously they are trying very hard to get people to lease. Why? Do they make more money if you lease?

I do understand that VW is behind the 8 ball right now (Dieselgate, etc), and they are trying very hard to get people in the showrooms. I posted recently about my experience at a VW dealership, with no customers to be seen. But why would they care, and that much ($2.5k is a LOT of money), whether you lease or buy?

Mr_Shiftright · September 2016

The point is, of course, that if you don't have $600 a month to spend, it doesn't matter how much sugar the closer puts on it. The $244 "actual" payment is future money. The $600 is now money.

This is how people commit financial ruin. There's a "just $100 more a month" here, and another "just $250 a month there"....car payment, mortgage payment, root canal, wedding, vacation overspend, blah blah...and suddenly, the death spiral.

berri · September 2016

Leases get buyers back in the showroom faster

Mr_Shiftright · September 2016

My only real resistance to leasing is that it is hard to bail out early.

oldfarmer50 · September 2016

graphicguy said:

oldfarmer50 said:

jmonroe said:

oldfarmer50 said:

jmonroe said:
@imidazol97 said:

All of us may know someone who has a get-out-of-jail free card because of a law enforcement relative or political position relative.

And Mrs. j used that card one time back in the late '80's.

I was out of town for a week and I usually called home after I got to where I was going to let her know that I was still alive so I called the first night after I got back from dinner. She tells me she got a ticket for driving down a street to get to our house that has a sign that says, "No Thru Traffic". They have this posted so that people don't cut through this street to avoid having to go to the light less than one block further down the main road and then make the turn there. Everybody was aware of this and I heard a lot of complaints from people saying, "it must be nice to have your own private street. I pay the same in taxes as they do but I don't have a posted street". I had commented several times that I thought it was a valid restriction because otherwise that street would literally be a highway for all of the cars that would travel it to get to the many streets from it just so they could avoid the light.

The reason Mrs. j got her ticket is because she could see road work on the main drag close to the light and saw cars backing up so she made the left turn to go down this restricted street. Sure enough a cop parked in the driveway of a house about 20 houses down this street pulls her over. She told the cop why she did it but he didn't care just said something like "that is not an excuse for making that turn". As she is telling me about it I can tell that she is furious. I told her to talk to my Mother whose next door neighbors were the parents of a lieutenant on the local force to see if that ticket could be disposed of. The son, who we had met a few times, called Mrs. j the next day to hear her side of the story first hand and after hearing it said, "the guy who gave you the ticket is usually a pretty reasonable officer but every now and then he gets a hair up his xxx and can be a totally different person. Don't worry about the ticket, I have it in my hand and it's going into the can when we hang up".

Like you said, all of us know someone and the higher up they are the better.

jmonroe
I feel bad, I don't know anybody. Whenever I got a ticket I paid it.

I feel sorry for you and I'm kind of surprised since you drive a school bus.

Maybe you otta ask for a route to deliver brats that live in a more upscale neighborhood.

jmonroe
I work with a couple of ex cops but since I haven't had a ticket in the last three decades i don't know if they would do me any good.

As to the upscale neighborhoods forget that. You rich people look down on us bus drivers as just another of their servants. Even their kids figure we're just part of the little people.

I once had a rich kid tell me "my mom's a lawyer and she could have your job".

I asked him if he thought his mom could afford the pay cut. That shut him up.

Should have told him to "go fetch your shine box"!

You trying to get me whacked?

oldfarmer50 · September 2016

bwia said:
How to Close the sale when the customer objects that the payment is too high. I thought I'd share this short training video that appears to be quite effective, and probably more so if the vehicle has a high residual value.

From that perspective, it makes leasing very expensive by comparison and thus the old saying -- leasing is for suckers. Enjoy!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vO9APD0yc1U

If that guy pulled crap like that on me I'd be out the door before he could ask "where you going". I realize though that most people would fall for it and so it is used every day.

roadburner · September 2016

@graphicguy: Remember that M235i convertible I posted for you back in August? Well, our current asking price is $7,651 under MSRP.
Just sayin'...

stickguy · September 2016

I liked that video. Entertaining.

as to leasing, it is not some mystical entity of evil. It is nothing more than an alternative way to finance. If leases are the devil, so is taking on car payments.

and why they subsidize leases so heavily, I kind of wondered the same thing. I know it creates a somewhat captive audience, and it guarantees a stream of nice, 2-3 YO units to CPO. other than that, I got nuttin.

that guys example actual makes a valid point (not the way he is trying though). People often look just at the price (in this case, payment), and ignore TCO (depreciation). he works it in terms of effective payment (savings plan) but certainly valid to look at total depreciation (how a more expensive car can end up being cheaper in the long run).

stickguy · September 2016

roadburner said:
@graphicguy: Remember that M235i convertible I posted for you back in August? Well, our current asking price is $7,651 under MSRP.
Just sayin'...

I'm in, as long as MSRP is only $22,349. Or if you guys want to eat the other $25K or so? I assume one of them runs a good 55 large.

jpp75 · September 2016

ab348 said:

verdugo said:

stever said:
Not an option with this software afaik. And besides, it says right in the Membership Agreement that we welcome all points of view here. Just like in real life - everywhere but your own living room. And perhaps certain relatives...
But how about giving us, I don't know, an ignore feature? Only every single other forum has had it since I don't know how long. You guys should really talk to your vendor.
+1. Especially since a plug-in seems to already exist:

https://vanillaforums.org/addon/ignore-plugin

That would come in extremely handy on the "What Would It Take For You to Buy a Diesel Car" forum....

oldfarmer50 · September 2016

roadburner said:
@graphicguy: Remember that M235i convertible I posted for you back in August? Well, our current asking price is $7,651 under MSRP.
Just sayin'...

But at the end of 60 months it will only have cost me half of the begining cost, right? Isn't that what the salesman in the video said?

Actually, could you post that again. I could never afford it but I'd like to window shop a little.

Mr_Shiftright · September 2016

60% I think he said.

stickguy · September 2016

said the MDX would have a residual of 40% after 5 years, so probably about right. 20K off a 50K sticker.

roadburner · September 2016

oldfarmer50 said:

roadburner said:
@graphicguy: Remember that M235i convertible I posted for you back in August? Well, our current asking price is $7,651 under MSRP.
Just sayin'...
But at the end of 60 months it will only have cost me half of the beginning cost, right? Isn't that what the salesman in the video said?

Actually, could you post that again. I could never afford it but I'd like to window shop a little.

It's a really nice car with most every option, a manual gearbox, and the terrific sounding M Performance exhaust:

oldfarmer50 · September 2016

roadburner said:

oldfarmer50 said:

roadburner said:
@graphicguy: Remember that M235i convertible I posted for you back in August? Well, our current asking price is $7,651 under MSRP.
Just sayin'...
But at the end of 60 months it will only have cost me half of the beginning cost, right? Isn't that what the salesman in the video said?

Actually, could you post that again. I could never afford it but I'd like to window shop a little.
It's a really nice car with most every option, a manual gearbox, and the terrific sounding M Performance exhaust:

Dang, that is nice.

roadburner · September 2016

I told the New Car Manager that I thought this car would make a great BMW Genius company car- a 2016 435i M Sport with a stick, the Track Handling Package, and nearly every M Performance accessory(including the Power Kit):

andres3 · September 2016

fintail said:
Work to change it, LOLOLOLOL, it took virtually a generation to overturn the dopey 55 mandate that the law and order hypocrites embraced like it was gospel. Good luck. One almost has to go the FOIA route to get the rulemakers to show how they determine limits on specific roads, or how they manage traffic controls. Work to change it - not my job. The people making the claims need to be able to document and defend their claims when asked. And who determines what is a "valid" reason? LOLOLOLOL funny. They need to put up or shut up.

snakeweasel said:

fintail said:
When the brave ones who set and enforce speed limits can justify the numbers, then we can talk about the morality of observing them.
The flip side of that is that those who think the speed limits are wrong need to justify why they are wrong.

If you think they are wrong give a valid reason why then work to change it.

Agreed. It is not the citizen that is establishing the speed limit, it is the governmental entity. Since they are the one establishing and enforcing it, they should be able to defend and justify those rules. It's really easy, follow traffic engineering conventions that are virtually unanimously agreed to when revenue isn't a factor, set them to the 85th percentile for maximum safety benefit and flow.

Frankly, it's a pain in the rear to fight tickets using the judicial system, but that's far easier than trying to get a speed limit changed. The problem is those that set speed limits appear not to care about rules, engineering, safety, or anything else other than making top dollar off the motorist.

It took a long time to get rid of red-light cameras in many local areas, and there was never any justification for the other side to keep them up. Usually they were taken down when the officials realized they weren't making a profit or that tourism was negatively impacted because people don't like getting a $500+ ticket in the mail as a "thank you for visiting."

andres3 · September 2016

snakeweasel said:

fintail said:
When the brave ones who set and enforce speed limits can justify the numbers, then we can talk about the morality of observing them.
The flip side of that is that those who think the speed limits are wrong need to justify why they are wrong.

If you think they are wrong give a valid reason why then work to change it.

Valid reason = you are not following accepted professional conventions in setting speed limits.

Work to change it????

What do you suggest? Writing letters? Visiting city councilmen in their offices to discuss? Getting the Police Chief on board?

I'm afraid it is easier to vote with the right foot and take pounds of flesh off each other in court.

andres3 · September 2016

henryn said:
Last night I was very happy with the brakes on my Passat. I was driving along a busy surface street, 4 lanes, divided with an esplanade. About 8:30, full dark, but good street lighting, businesses all along the street on both sides.

A fair bit of traffic, but not congested, cars spaced and moving at about 30 mph. I was in the right hand lane, as I was going to make a right turn at the next light. Some idiot sitting at the stop sign on a side street, decides to pull out in front of me. I mean, directly in front of me. Very luckily, I was looking right at him, saw what he was doing as soon as he started doing it, and hit the brakes very hard. The Passat stopped with about 2 feet to spare, very, very close thing.

If I had been looking down at the radio, or thinking about work, or any of a hundred different things, I would have hit him square in the driver’s door at 30 mph. If I had been driving my truck, I would have hit him, the truck is new (5k miles), so perfect brakes, but a pickup truck, any half ton pickup, cannot stop as quickly as the Passat did.

Now imagine is someone had skimped on decent tires and lengthened their stopping distance 4 feet because of that. Frankly, just another couple feet could be the difference between a claim and no claim, points or no points. There is so much riding on your tires (end of commercial here).

andres3 · September 2016

berri said:
Leases get buyers back in the showroom faster

I've only leases with Kia so I'll talk to that experience:

A lease forces you to be a potential customer a couple years down the road.

There is a so-called "disposition" fee that is really nothing other than a "Don't you dare leave us for another brand $400 fee."

So if you buy or lease from the same company again, this fee is waived apparently.

andres3 · September 2016

I was reading a lot of comments on the Car & Driver website the other night, and it was pretty funny.

A lot of comments about the TTS, M2, and GT350 from people that had obviously never driven any of them since they are recent models that just came out in the last year (or were redesigned).

These facts from C/D's tests were interesting:

TT-S - $58k
- 0-60 in 4.2
- 1/4 mile in 12.8 at 108mph
- 0.98g Skidpad
- 70-0 in 157ft.
* 21mpg
* AWD

ATS-V Coupe - $75k
- 0-60 in 4.2
- 1/4 mile 12.6 at 115mph
- 0.97g Skidpad
- 70-0 in 154ft.
* 20mpg
* RWD

Other competitors to the TTS that people used for comparison purposes included:

Cayman (base model), Cayman S

I think the Cayman S I test drove had either stale gas or 87 octane in it.

driver100 · September 2016

Quick update from Bern Switzerland. Insurance company found a dealer who will sell me the same car for about $3000 less than my dealer.....so that is the amount they are offering. But it doesn't include technology package ($2600), which my last car had.
Have to fight it out, nothing comes easy.

Sleazy dealer with $3000 lower price does etching for $300! That turns me off right there.

Michaell · September 2016

andres3 said:

berri said:
Leases get buyers back in the showroom faster
I've only leases with Kia so I'll talk to that experience:

A lease forces you to be a potential customer a couple years down the road.

There is a so-called "disposition" fee that is really nothing other than a "Don't you dare leave us for another brand $400 fee."

So if you buy or lease from the same company again, this fee is waived apparently.

I got out of my Hyundai lease two months early by trading it in for a VW lease. No disposition fee paid by either me or the dealer.

The only lease I kept to maturity and didn't buy out or replace with another lease was with GE Capital back in the 90's. I didn't pay a disposition fee then - but, I don't think they existed at the time.

graphicguy · September 2016

snakeweasel said:

imidazol97 said:

Just think how many of those could be laid off or moved to a productive position if the unnecessary tickets were abolished.

However, I am in favor of enforcing the laws, equally, for everyone. I like to notice the speeds the policemen drive on duty as well as off duty on the same roads where they give out tickets. For quite a while, the obnoxious speeders and tailgaters around this area had the little FOP metal badges on their rear license plate. And they drove like bats out of hill often in ego cars.

All of us may know someone who has a get-out-of-jail free card because of a law enforcement relative or political position relative.

However, I am in favor of stern enforcement of speed limits on the part of the obnoxious folks. Arch examples are those who treat the high speed lane as their personal diamond lane and expect anyone else to be out of that lane before they speed up on their rears. IOW, the "little people" should follow the laws and be in "their" lanes crowded as they may be, to allow the special folks to flagrantly speed past in lane #4 of 4 on I75 south, e.g..

Are you saying that we should have laws but not enforce them?

I agree that it should be equally enforced but not to enforce them simply because some think they are unnecessary is wrong.

Also note that in most cases in minor traffic offenses it is the officers discretion if they write a ticket.

Not too much in recent years, but in the past, there used to be people who would happen by the old SFTSFL thread asking if they received a good deal...mostly payment buyers. After we would walk them backwards through the deal (APR, Trade value, equity or lack thereof, etc) we'd finally get to the actual purchase price. Sometimes good, sometimes not.

At the end of the day, and we say it here all the time, too.....as long as you're happy with your deal, then it's all good.

But, don't shop payment. The deal is the purchase price, licensing fees, taxes, tags. That's it. Know what you're willing to pay based on those factors, and you'll KNOW if you received a good deal or not, and not have to ask.

If you're financing, shop APR. IF you have a trade, get 2 or 3 different sources for the value of the trade.

Leasing? Entirely different animal. I'm sure there are people here who are much more well versed on leasing than I am.

graphicguy · September 2016

roadburner said:
@graphicguy: Remember that M235i convertible I posted for you back in August? Well, our current asking price is $7,651 under MSRP.
Just sayin'...

You are so evil on so many different levels.......

Can you re-post the link to the car's description? Wanna take a look at the equipment levels, again.

Beaurtiful car!

graphicguy · September 2016

driver100 said:
Quick update from Bern Switzerland. Insurance company found a dealer who will sell me the same car for about $3000 less than my dealer.....so that is the amount they are offering. But it doesn't include technology package ($2600), which my last car had.
Have to fight it out, nothing comes easy.

Sleazy dealer with $3000 lower price does etching for $300! That turns me off right there.

Driver....that really irritates me. You pay insurance for just these types of situations. When it's time for THEM to pay out, they play these types of games.

Did you show them how the equipment levels don't match up? Why are they shopping for the replacement? You're the one who has to be happy with the car, not the insurance company!

stickguy · September 2016

the insurance company isn't buying it. Just trolling around to find the lowest offer, so they could write driver a smaller check.

jmonroe · September 2016

oldfarmer50 said:

roadburner said:

oldfarmer50 said:

roadburner said:
@graphicguy: Remember that M235i convertible I posted for you back in August? Well, our current asking price is $7,651 under MSRP.
Just sayin'...
But at the end of 60 months it will only have cost me half of the beginning cost, right? Isn't that what the salesman in the video said?

Actually, could you post that again. I could never afford it but I'd like to window shop a little.
It's a really nice car with most every option, a manual gearbox, and the terrific sounding M Performance exhaust:

Dang, that is nice.

Who do you think is going to buy it now that you have drooled all over it?

OK...the line forms to the right.

jmonroe

snakeweasel · September 2016

andres3 said:

You miss a key point. The money grab is to self support in a very selfish way their own pointless salaries and jobs. They do the money grab to justify their worthless jobs. They pay for their fancy buildings, courtrooms lined with fancy wood, high salaries, and super benefits at motorists expense.

You missed the point, traffic enforcement in the vast majority of this country is a joke. Outside of major holidays where there are historically more traffic accidents and/or impaired drivers it is a rare occurrence to see someone pulled over. Around here it is almost unheard of that someone gets pulled over for doing 5-10 MPH over the limit (although there are a small number of jurisdictions that will get you for anything over speed limit but it is well under 1%). Those people who you say have the "worthless jobs" are also the very same people that get the drunk drivers and reckless drivers off the road and adjudicate accidents. Are you suggesting that we don't go after them?

Again if it were the cash grab that many of you make it out to be there would be a lot more people pulled over. I know of some roads where they could put a toll booth in the middle of the road and give everyone a speeding ticket simply because everyone goes way over the speed limit on that road, yet I have never seen anyone pulled over and I drive down it a lot.

andres3 said:
The 85% rule is proven statistical science. There might not be a study for every single percentile number, but numerous studies have shown that 85% is the safest sweet spot vs. say 80 or 95%.

Actually it isn't, all those numerous studies puts that "safe sweet spot" between 50% and 90% which is hardly statistically sound. So why not 90% or 80% or 50%? It's an arbitrary number picked between those two numbers. Secondly the whole idea about the 85 percentile is that 85% of the drivers want to drive safe and not be in an accident. Does this mean that 15% of the drivers want to be in an accident? Don't you think that 100% of the drivers out there want to drive in a way where they don't get into an accident? I sure hope so, so why isn't it 100%?

Also please note that most traffic and road engineers will tell you that the 85 percentile is just a starting point and may be raised or lowered due to a multitude of conditions.

andres3 said:
The problem is that many jurisdictions don't round up!!!!! I know this first hand from pulling a few traffic engineering surveys (via informal discovery request) in my trials over the years. They often round down, or worse, round down, and then take away another 5 MPH for revenue generation reasons. The 35 MPH speed limit on infamous Lake Murray Blvd. in La Mesa is case in point; 85th percentile speed from over 10 years ago was 41 MPH. 45 would be appropriate as a speed limit (I agree with you.) Do they round down to 40; nah; they go down to 35! I've received 2 tickets in that zone! Defeated both; I think they know they are indefensible unjustifiable tickets and never show in court on those! Curious about the accident rate on that road justifying the 35, how is 1/6th or 1/8th of the average amount of accidents per vehicle mile traveled sitting with you!

I don't know what you are talking about with the 1/6th or 1/8th figures that you must have pulled out of thin air. Now for your example of Lake Murray Blvd, the street I mentioned earlier is the same situation, the 85% was 41 or so but they put it to 35MPH. The road has some significant curves, hills no shoulder, thick tall vegetation right up to the side of the road and DEER. Because of the hills, curves and vegetation there are a few spots on this road where your view is limited to 100 feet give or take. Now while these turns are easily taken at 45 mph if there was something stopped head of you, say a deer, just around one of these turns good luck stopping if you are going 45 MPH. However if you are going 35 mph or so and came to this curve and saw something stopped, say the idiot going 45+ around the turn who hit the deer, just around the corner you have the ability to stop before hitting the other car.

And yes the deer situation happened to me.

andres3 said:
It doesn't take too long to run a survey on a new road and figure out the appropriate speed limit. Not posting any speed limits will not lead to mayhem and carnage in the meantime. No need to waste tax payer dollars on signs with the wrong number!
Roads have to have speed limits, if not signed then there is a default speed limit. Here in IL unposted urban streets are 30MPH, rural divided 4 lane highways are 65 and rural roads are 55.

But here is a novel idea, post a speed limit that the road was designed for.
andres3 said:
One thing I agree on, everyone involved in the ticket writing process is a significant drain on resources and human capital. What an utter waste. Would be much better spent countering the real bad guys; crazy gunmen going on shooting sprees, white collar crime, thieves, crooked banks, crooked insurance companies, lousy auto body shops, and left lane campers and traffic impeders.
Oh you want to eat your cake and have it too. Those people you despise and claim are a waste of resources are the very same people that would take care of people who are the so called left lane campers (which may or may not be illegal depending of jurisdiction and situation) and traffic impeders (which again well see left lane campers). So apparently these people are scum when they inconvenience you as a driver but are heros when they go after people you don't like. They call that hypocrisy.
andres3 said:
A wise person once said "The problem with more bad laws is they weaken and lessen the enforcement of the good ones!"
Another wise person once said "Just because you say it's so doesn't make it so."

Edmunds Members - Cars and Conversations (Archived)

Comments

Helpful Tools

Most popular vehicles

Your Privacy