New Ride

My ol' 1993 Grand Caravan died a couple of weeks ago - been using Tan Lucy Pez's Lumina since then. The compresser on the AC was the problem, and paying $800 to $1000 just wasn't gonna happen.

'Cause we had to replace DH's 1990 Dodge Shadow last summer, another new van was out of the question. Shopping for a used vehicle ain't no fun -- it's hard to find a van in good shape, relatively low mileage and with the features you hope to get, and still not pay too much. I was amazed at the prices - 2002 or 2003 vans with 50-60,000 miles were $15,000 and more!

Did alot of online looking, driving to dealers' lots to look and see, drove several. Was just beginning to decide what I was going to have to compromise on, when we found a used car dealer down the pike towards Gettysburg. I drove an '02 that had about 37,000 miles on it, was in good shape, had most of what I had hoped to get (CD player, front/rear temp control, keyless entry) . And it was $13,900, less than anything else I had even considered buying, and was under 38,000. I told Bill Wessel (the owner of the business) that I liked it, just wished that it had bucket seats instead of that bench seat for the Kiddies.

"Can't have everything, I guess," I said.

"Sure you can," said he. Turned out that there was an '01 in the shop getting inspected and new tires, and hadn't been on the lot yet. Had even less mileage - under 35,000. Had all the features that the one I had just driven had, plus those coveted bucket seats!

And it has a power side door! It is sooo cool to hit the button in the house and see it slide open and closed. (Am I easy to amuse, or what?)

It seemed like it was CARma that we got this van:

1. First, Bill having the van I wanted (thank goodness I mentioned what I wanted!)
2. Second, the interior color is EXACTLY the same blue as my purse (okay, this IS silly, but had to be mentioned)
3. It turns out that our mechanic of 15 years went to school with the car dealer, and said we could trust him
4. The very thing that caused us to shop for a new van - the AC compressor - is the ONLY thing that is still under warranty with the new van.
5. The price was only $12,900!
6. We are finishing a loan this month, and had hoped to keep the new van loan at about the same price per month, since we were already budgeting for that. The new loan is actually $15 less per month!