The car I, thank god, never bought.
Aug. 18th, 2013 08:38 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
icarusI hate to admit to being a snow bunny. I've never been a girly girl. I can use a hammer, change a tire, hang drywall, strip wallpaper, and do all kinds of non-girly things. Home Depot is my second home. I took auto mechanics in school.
But I always left the car research up to my Ex, WG. We were together a little over twelve years. Before that, my stepdad picked out my cars. And my most recent car was found for me by my mechanic.
I've been spoiled.
Well.
I've just been spit out the other side of a potentially bad car deal, saved thanks to my very protective credit union, MAFCU.
This is my fault.
With grad school looming I wanted to get a car, quick. This fellow came highly recommended, and he volunteered to pick out a car at auction. No, I wouldn't be with him when he bought it. But if I didn't like the car, no problem.
Suuuure.
The first problem was that he told me about a 2006 Honda Civic Hybrid (the bank is forcing me to buy a 2006 or newer, not my usual ten-year-old car), but then called up in a panic because he'd overspent my budget by $500.
On a 2006 with 100k miles? I was sure at auction that one should be closer to $6k....
No, no, that car didn't show. He bought a 2008 for $8500.
Uhh.
The panic in his voice told me right away that his promise of no pressure if I didn't like the car was pure B.S. Then he tells me he bought the car with his personal hard-earned money (uh, didn't he tell the person who recommended him that he did this all the time--?). Wrung my heart-strings, he did. He didn't need a fee or anything, don't worry, he'd overspent my budget so he would do it just for free.
Well... the bank loan actually did extend above the budget I gave him. I just didn't want the highest possible car payment two weeks before grad school.
I'm not happy, but I say okay. And yes, of course he'd get a finder's fee, what kind of person did he think I was?
A damned stupid one I learn later, but we'll get to that.
He brings the car down so I can have my buddy Jonas, who's a mechanic, look at it.
My first sight of the car ... I don't like it.
I don't like the grey-ish taupe color.
I don't like the body style.
I really don't like the squinty headlights.
I don't like the quiet, clicky, electric engine.
I don't get that "oh dear, a lemon" feeling. More like I'm looking at the essence of mediocrity.
I paste a smile on my face and tell him I love it.
We take it over to Jonas. He's direct and matter-of-fact. It's a 2008, nothing much wrong with it. He doesn't like the dirty engine but maybe it was run on a lot of dirt roads. He thinks the mileage is high for a newish car (it's at 110k). He drives it, explains he hasn't checked the fluids to see how it's been maintained, but overall, it's a good car. He shrugs. It's a 2008.
We drive it to MAFCU, which is going to Fed-X the guy a check.
Here's where the weird begins.
Of course he's not happy about not having the check in hand that day, though I'd explained that part already. But he's concerned about sending the check to the address on the purchase order.
Hwah?
Turns out that although he spent his own personal hard-earned money on the car, the auction dealer license belongs to his brother, and the car is titled in his brother's name for some reason. He's very worried about getting the money from his brother, calls him, and is reassured. Seems that he doesn't trust his brother. I was a little bug-eyed at this family vignette. Also, their last names don't match, which is odd.
The next stop after MAFCU is to check my email and sign the documents. I'm mentally decorating to see if I can improve this car at least from the inside, and at least as a hybrid it'll have good gas mileage ... my rationalizations are starting to work and I cheer up. We park it near the house, he gives me the keys, takes the dealer plate off, and takes a photo with me in front of the car. I paste on another smile.
I go downstairs to sign the email docs from MAFCU (my loan agent works from home).
MAFCU has refused the loan.
Nothing to do with me. They just don't trust auction cars. Their customers have had bad experiences and "You're a member, not a customer. We're here to look out for you." (I learn later that cars flooded in Hurricane Sandy are being dumped in auctions all up and down the coast.)
I have to go to work so I contact mom to help me let the guy know that the financing didn't go through. I feel *terrible.* There goes his personal, hard-earned money (though how the car's titled in his brother's name...).
The guy, it turns out, is not at all worried. "They just want to see a clear title, no problem, we deal with this all the time." Oh. Okay, no problem.
At this point I'm getting used to the idea that I'm going to have a car. I need to get it Maryland Inspected, get it to the MVA. I need to go up to New York on Friday, there might be time to get it plated by then if....
The next day I explain to Tim at the MAFCU that this car cost the fellow his personal, hard-earned money. Tim perks up. "This is a purchase from an individual? Because the purchase order was from an auction dealer. We'll deal with an individual."
Off to work again (where I can't take or make personal calls, obviously, in front of my students), I reenlist mom's help: if it's titled in the guy's name, this can still work.
But weirdly the guy doesn't want to do that. He puts his brother on the line -- a wheeler-dealer, mom describes, "With an attitude that he could make any problem 'go away.' I don't trust him." And neither, of course, did his brother. Tim at MAFCU confides in her that once the loan department has turned someone down, they generally don't reconsider. But neither of them tell me this because they think I want the car.
In the meantime, I get the car Maryland Inspected, there's tail light bulb out that I have replaced for twelve bucks, there might be time to get it to the MVA before Friday, so I put on my insurance....
Annnd the bombshell drops.
The bank requires full insurance. Not just collision. On the stealable Honda Civic. My not-horrible-though-not-pleasant car payment of $158 suddenly balloons to $250 a month total for the car.
I was used to paying $64, total, no car payment.
That evening in my sessions, as my students wrote their essays and did multiple choice, I glumly ran the numbers. There was no way I could afford this car.
Friday morning I called the bank and told them to let it go. With the insurance the car was beyond my means.
I feel terrible for the car guy, but there's no way. And, well, he has his brother's dealership ... I can give him the Maryland Inspection Certificate, that'll help him sell it....
It's 7am and I leave in an hour for New York. I know if I drop this bombshell on the guy with the car and then skip town, he'll go nuts, so I just mention I'm going out of town and we'll talk on Monday. He texts back, "Okay, Monday then."
He goes nuts anyways.
He calls mom all. weekend. long, over and over again. He calls her sister Sandra (whom he's done work for). He leaves me voicemails, emails, and texts. Of course, I'm out on retreat in the hills of lower New York state without a cellphone or computer, blissfully unaware. He even contacts a friend who did work with mom and has the *friend* call mom.
What the hell he thinks mom's going to do with me out of town, I've no idea. The car, by the way, is sitting with no plates in the townhouse parking lot. I have the keys but no title. He doesn't even have the title because it's all in his brother's (?) name.
I return late Saturday night to a lot of freaked out messages to the tune of "Noooooooooo! Don't do this to me!" I discover mom finally emailed him to say that with the insurance the car was beyond my means. I text him at 2am and reassure him, there, there, we'll figure something out, just not at 2 o'clock in the morning. He wants to arrange financing through his mother-in-law-? I get a queasy-bad-deal feeling and tell him to get some sleep.
That's when I have my most embarrassing moment of the whole deal.
Feeling horribly guilty, trying to work out some creative solution, I finally do what I should've done in the first place:
I checked the blue book value on the car.
Maybe if I bought it and turned around and sold it...
...wait, what?
Dad, I have no idea why I didn't do this in the first place. Maybe I'm used to having my ex, Dave, handle all the financial stuff. I grew quite spoiled and he was good at it. We were together twelve years. Or maybe I've dealt with a lot of really honest people. I've been lucky like that. Or maybe I just had it in my mind that "auction" meant "deal" and I just ... didn't check it out.
But I was buying a $7200 car for $8500.
It occurred to me that he may have built in his finder's fee. Quite a hefty one at that.
Dad, I was so relieved. Those heart-strings he was pulling broke with a loud, happy TWAAANNNNG! At 4am I texted and let him know that Blue Book value, that I wasn't happy with him, but in reality all I could think was, "I'm FREE! I'm FREE!" as I danced a jig.
The next day mom and I had a wonderful time researching where to send his car keys. We both unplugged our phones as our voicemails filled with messages from him.
She said, "You have the keys?! What? Why? Why did he do that? No wonder he was so freaked out. He was out a car!"
Me: "Yes, possession is nine-tenths of the law."
Her: "No. It's all of the law."
Given the fellow didn't trust his brother(?) we decided to do him the undeserved favor of getting his home address. Took a bit of doing, and we learned a lot about his complicated life just researching on the internet (she's quite good at this). I confirmed the address to him in chat, ignoring anything extraneous. Once he realized I wasn't buying the car, once he realized I wasn't meeting him in person or talking on the phone, yes: please do not send the keys to the address on the purchase order. He confirmed the home address.
I made sure I got a signature on that Fed-Ex package. And I included the Maryland Inspection Certificate.
Today he signed for it.
So, the keys are gone. No more phone calls. He left one final obnoxious text last night, more or less shaking his fist and demanding that I put the plate from my 2002 Honda on that car so that it doesn't get towed, because if anything happened to it, "it's your responsibility! Buy [sic] law."
No. It's not.
The day after he got the keys, the car was gone.
Colophon: a week later, he texted me to see if he could buy my 2002 totaled Honda Civic. No kidding!
But I always left the car research up to my Ex, WG. We were together a little over twelve years. Before that, my stepdad picked out my cars. And my most recent car was found for me by my mechanic.
I've been spoiled.
Well.
I've just been spit out the other side of a potentially bad car deal, saved thanks to my very protective credit union, MAFCU.
This is my fault.
With grad school looming I wanted to get a car, quick. This fellow came highly recommended, and he volunteered to pick out a car at auction. No, I wouldn't be with him when he bought it. But if I didn't like the car, no problem.
Suuuure.
The first problem was that he told me about a 2006 Honda Civic Hybrid (the bank is forcing me to buy a 2006 or newer, not my usual ten-year-old car), but then called up in a panic because he'd overspent my budget by $500.
On a 2006 with 100k miles? I was sure at auction that one should be closer to $6k....
No, no, that car didn't show. He bought a 2008 for $8500.
Uhh.
The panic in his voice told me right away that his promise of no pressure if I didn't like the car was pure B.S. Then he tells me he bought the car with his personal hard-earned money (uh, didn't he tell the person who recommended him that he did this all the time--?). Wrung my heart-strings, he did. He didn't need a fee or anything, don't worry, he'd overspent my budget so he would do it just for free.
Well... the bank loan actually did extend above the budget I gave him. I just didn't want the highest possible car payment two weeks before grad school.
I'm not happy, but I say okay. And yes, of course he'd get a finder's fee, what kind of person did he think I was?
A damned stupid one I learn later, but we'll get to that.
He brings the car down so I can have my buddy Jonas, who's a mechanic, look at it.
My first sight of the car ... I don't like it.
I don't like the grey-ish taupe color.
I don't like the body style.
I really don't like the squinty headlights.
I don't like the quiet, clicky, electric engine.
I don't get that "oh dear, a lemon" feeling. More like I'm looking at the essence of mediocrity.
I paste a smile on my face and tell him I love it.
We take it over to Jonas. He's direct and matter-of-fact. It's a 2008, nothing much wrong with it. He doesn't like the dirty engine but maybe it was run on a lot of dirt roads. He thinks the mileage is high for a newish car (it's at 110k). He drives it, explains he hasn't checked the fluids to see how it's been maintained, but overall, it's a good car. He shrugs. It's a 2008.
We drive it to MAFCU, which is going to Fed-X the guy a check.
Here's where the weird begins.
Of course he's not happy about not having the check in hand that day, though I'd explained that part already. But he's concerned about sending the check to the address on the purchase order.
Hwah?
Turns out that although he spent his own personal hard-earned money on the car, the auction dealer license belongs to his brother, and the car is titled in his brother's name for some reason. He's very worried about getting the money from his brother, calls him, and is reassured. Seems that he doesn't trust his brother. I was a little bug-eyed at this family vignette. Also, their last names don't match, which is odd.
The next stop after MAFCU is to check my email and sign the documents. I'm mentally decorating to see if I can improve this car at least from the inside, and at least as a hybrid it'll have good gas mileage ... my rationalizations are starting to work and I cheer up. We park it near the house, he gives me the keys, takes the dealer plate off, and takes a photo with me in front of the car. I paste on another smile.
I go downstairs to sign the email docs from MAFCU (my loan agent works from home).
MAFCU has refused the loan.
Nothing to do with me. They just don't trust auction cars. Their customers have had bad experiences and "You're a member, not a customer. We're here to look out for you." (I learn later that cars flooded in Hurricane Sandy are being dumped in auctions all up and down the coast.)
I have to go to work so I contact mom to help me let the guy know that the financing didn't go through. I feel *terrible.* There goes his personal, hard-earned money (though how the car's titled in his brother's name...).
The guy, it turns out, is not at all worried. "They just want to see a clear title, no problem, we deal with this all the time." Oh. Okay, no problem.
At this point I'm getting used to the idea that I'm going to have a car. I need to get it Maryland Inspected, get it to the MVA. I need to go up to New York on Friday, there might be time to get it plated by then if....
The next day I explain to Tim at the MAFCU that this car cost the fellow his personal, hard-earned money. Tim perks up. "This is a purchase from an individual? Because the purchase order was from an auction dealer. We'll deal with an individual."
Off to work again (where I can't take or make personal calls, obviously, in front of my students), I reenlist mom's help: if it's titled in the guy's name, this can still work.
But weirdly the guy doesn't want to do that. He puts his brother on the line -- a wheeler-dealer, mom describes, "With an attitude that he could make any problem 'go away.' I don't trust him." And neither, of course, did his brother. Tim at MAFCU confides in her that once the loan department has turned someone down, they generally don't reconsider. But neither of them tell me this because they think I want the car.
In the meantime, I get the car Maryland Inspected, there's tail light bulb out that I have replaced for twelve bucks, there might be time to get it to the MVA before Friday, so I put on my insurance....
Annnd the bombshell drops.
The bank requires full insurance. Not just collision. On the stealable Honda Civic. My not-horrible-though-not-pleasant car payment of $158 suddenly balloons to $250 a month total for the car.
I was used to paying $64, total, no car payment.
That evening in my sessions, as my students wrote their essays and did multiple choice, I glumly ran the numbers. There was no way I could afford this car.
Friday morning I called the bank and told them to let it go. With the insurance the car was beyond my means.
I feel terrible for the car guy, but there's no way. And, well, he has his brother's dealership ... I can give him the Maryland Inspection Certificate, that'll help him sell it....
It's 7am and I leave in an hour for New York. I know if I drop this bombshell on the guy with the car and then skip town, he'll go nuts, so I just mention I'm going out of town and we'll talk on Monday. He texts back, "Okay, Monday then."
He goes nuts anyways.
He calls mom all. weekend. long, over and over again. He calls her sister Sandra (whom he's done work for). He leaves me voicemails, emails, and texts. Of course, I'm out on retreat in the hills of lower New York state without a cellphone or computer, blissfully unaware. He even contacts a friend who did work with mom and has the *friend* call mom.
What the hell he thinks mom's going to do with me out of town, I've no idea. The car, by the way, is sitting with no plates in the townhouse parking lot. I have the keys but no title. He doesn't even have the title because it's all in his brother's (?) name.
I return late Saturday night to a lot of freaked out messages to the tune of "Noooooooooo! Don't do this to me!" I discover mom finally emailed him to say that with the insurance the car was beyond my means. I text him at 2am and reassure him, there, there, we'll figure something out, just not at 2 o'clock in the morning. He wants to arrange financing through his mother-in-law-? I get a queasy-bad-deal feeling and tell him to get some sleep.
That's when I have my most embarrassing moment of the whole deal.
Feeling horribly guilty, trying to work out some creative solution, I finally do what I should've done in the first place:
I checked the blue book value on the car.
Maybe if I bought it and turned around and sold it...
...wait, what?
Dad, I have no idea why I didn't do this in the first place. Maybe I'm used to having my ex, Dave, handle all the financial stuff. I grew quite spoiled and he was good at it. We were together twelve years. Or maybe I've dealt with a lot of really honest people. I've been lucky like that. Or maybe I just had it in my mind that "auction" meant "deal" and I just ... didn't check it out.
But I was buying a $7200 car for $8500.
It occurred to me that he may have built in his finder's fee. Quite a hefty one at that.
Dad, I was so relieved. Those heart-strings he was pulling broke with a loud, happy TWAAANNNNG! At 4am I texted and let him know that Blue Book value, that I wasn't happy with him, but in reality all I could think was, "I'm FREE! I'm FREE!" as I danced a jig.
The next day mom and I had a wonderful time researching where to send his car keys. We both unplugged our phones as our voicemails filled with messages from him.
She said, "You have the keys?! What? Why? Why did he do that? No wonder he was so freaked out. He was out a car!"
Me: "Yes, possession is nine-tenths of the law."
Her: "No. It's all of the law."
Given the fellow didn't trust his brother(?) we decided to do him the undeserved favor of getting his home address. Took a bit of doing, and we learned a lot about his complicated life just researching on the internet (she's quite good at this). I confirmed the address to him in chat, ignoring anything extraneous. Once he realized I wasn't buying the car, once he realized I wasn't meeting him in person or talking on the phone, yes: please do not send the keys to the address on the purchase order. He confirmed the home address.
I made sure I got a signature on that Fed-Ex package. And I included the Maryland Inspection Certificate.
Today he signed for it.
So, the keys are gone. No more phone calls. He left one final obnoxious text last night, more or less shaking his fist and demanding that I put the plate from my 2002 Honda on that car so that it doesn't get towed, because if anything happened to it, "it's your responsibility! Buy [sic] law."
No. It's not.
The day after he got the keys, the car was gone.
Colophon: a week later, he texted me to see if he could buy my 2002 totaled Honda Civic. No kidding!
no subject
Date: 2013-08-19 02:16 am (UTC)So, back on the search?
no subject
Date: 2013-08-19 04:14 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-08-19 02:44 pm (UTC)With a sword and staff weapon! You'd get the best financing deal ever!
no subject
Date: 2013-08-19 04:31 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-08-21 08:01 am (UTC)I'm cheering you on though! I hope the next try works out better! (and hey, your bank sounds pretty cool.)
no subject
Date: 2013-08-23 09:36 am (UTC)I pass the spot where The Car used to be and quietly rejoice. Every time.