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Need a New Car


Raindog

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boy do i have experience with this lately... hope he's ok is all whats important.  im on my 4th car with the previous 3 being totalled from other people driving it ha!  ill admit: im a sellout to foreign cars due to them being generally more reliable.  i think my nissan was my favorite car and lasted 8 years until it met the Auto-Destructor(emily) lol.  i also liked saturns and my friends had them growing up and they never seemed to have many issues compared to my first car(ford, never again).

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For what it is worth, my wife's Subaru has over 200k miles on it and is still running fine.  We do oil and regular maintenance and have had to do almost nothing else.  She drives it cross-country once every 5 years or so.  On one of those she had a concrete form come off a truck in front of her and land on her windshield and roof.  The car protected her.  The windshield and roof had to be replaced.

 

Hers is old enough that it is not a PZEV.  Cannot speak to those engine systems nor can I speak to the Forester models.

 

We buy new off the lot, get exactly what we want and then drive it for 15-20 years.  It's more expensive up front but then we save a lot of money in the 10-15 years with no car payment and I explicitly set that aside for the next car.  When you buy the next car for cash anything left in the account is an instant windfall.  Good deal.

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Oh, that reminds me.  Last time the vehicle was in the shop, we had a Hyundai Sonata Hybrid as a loner.  We decided to take a trip around the state, since we were getting roughly double the range per gallon of fuel.  Super comfortable ride.  Roomie interior.  Drove Bend>Crater Lake>Medford>Coos Bay>Newport>>Bend on a single tank, with fuel to spare.  If I weren't looking at getting a Harley next year, I'd probably be looking at getting a Sonata Hybrid from the experience we had with that loner.  :)

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Probably goes without saying these days, but...

 

When I figure out what I want (relying heavily on Consumer Reports and other reputable review sites), I contact all the regional (from the Canadian border to Portland) car dealerships that carry that make/model. I tell them what I want to buy, tell them that I'm contacting a slew of dealerships, and ask them to send me their best offer. Ended up having to drive a fair chunk to get what we wanted, but also saved about $3000 off what we would have paid at the next lowest dealership (and much, much more than the one above that).

 

Because you've got kids, I'd also suggest that YOU spend some time in the back of cars while you're test driving them. Get a feel for how much motion sickness the car might produce.

 

Best of luck!

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