{"id":48680,"date":"2022-03-25T20:24:59","date_gmt":"2022-03-26T01:24:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/totfc.net\/?p=48680"},"modified":"2022-03-27T20:25:12","modified_gmt":"2022-03-28T01:25:12","slug":"car-conundrum","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/totfc.net\/?p=48680","title":{"rendered":"Car conundrum"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/span><\/p>\n

Recently, I took my car to the dealership to have some maintenance done. Prior to my appointment, I got a message asking if I wanted to get an appraisal done on my car towards a possible trade in.\u00a0 Considering I\u2019ve already been thinking about a larger car since two kids have already made my current one feel like a Ford Festiva sometimes, I figured why not?\u00a0 I was already going to be waiting there so there was no harm in seeing what my current value was.<\/span><\/p>\n

Especially right now, where the car market is as volatile as the housing market and there\u2019s been lots of speak about how used cars were supposedly netting way more than people were owing on them.\u00a0 I\u2019d gotten emails and snail mail over the recent months claiming that my car would be worth well over $20,000 which was amusing to me considering I still owed around $13.5 on it.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I figured such estimates were bullshit and that there was no way my car would fetch that much once I were to get it officially appraised.<\/span><\/p>\n

Well turns out that it\u2019s not that much bullshit, because the dealership estimated my car at $24,000 to trade in.\u00a0 It\u2019s a 2019 with under 20,000 miles and in fantastic condition because I take care of my shit and the pandemic really prevented me from doing any real hardcore driving.<\/span><\/p>\n

So, despite me not being that serious about switching cars just yet, these kinds of numbers make it very interesting towards the possibility of doing so now.<\/span><\/p>\n

I get that the car market is similar to the housing market right now and I read the news too; I\u2019m aware that the car business has been hit with staggering inflation right now and that cars effectively have become haggle-proof.\u00a0 The demand for cars versus inventory means that if someone tries to be cute and haggle too much, the dealerships can pass and someone will purchase it for less trouble.<\/span><\/p>\n

In \u201cnormal\u201d circumstances, I would look in two years when my car were to be paid off, and I\u2019d hope to appraise for like $4,000 and then haggle the shit out of 2-3 dealerships before hoping to get $4,000 down from a not-so inflated sticker price.<\/span><\/p>\n

However in two years, my kids will be older and probably be in command of a whole lot more shit than they have now and I could already be too late in needing bigger then; especially when I have the opportunity now to potentially upsize and be ready for the future.<\/span><\/p>\n

So what I\u2019m looking at right now, is the opportunity to have nearly 8-9k in equity to put towards a new car, which is more than I\u2019ve ever put down in the past.\u00a0 Sure, it restarts my clock of payments back to the start for the next 60-72 months but frankly car payments are about as certain as death and taxes, and it\u2019s really the exception to be without them.<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been casually looking at numbers and basically $8-9k towards an inflated sticker price still seems like a more attractive option than waiting for then car market and it\u2019s potential trade market to cool and hope to look for a bargain and that my car doesn\u2019t appraise for peanuts in two years.<\/span><\/p>\n

Currently, I could flip my $30k car and aim for a $40k+ car but only needing to finance like $35k~.\u00a0 I feel like there\u2019s no guarantee I\u2019ll be able to do such if I were to wait.<\/span><\/p>\n

However on the flip side, I\u2019m concerned about the future of gas prices considering how easy it is for the price at the pump to flip on a whim, and mythical wife and I have had discussions about the disadvantages of owning a car that isn\u2019t gas powered.<\/span><\/p>\n

And that\u2019s where I am now. Leaning hard towards capitalizing on my car\u2019s current trade-in value and upsizing to a more famiry-friendly dadmobile, but hesitating on what exactly to change to.<\/span><\/p>\n

Waiting and standing pat doesn\u2019t seem as appealing because my car now already feels too small and capitalizing while the market is volatile seems like a good idea. I just don\u2019t want to make a rash choice that I might regret, but time doesn\u2019t exactly feel like it\u2019s on my side.<\/span><\/p>\n

Getting an appraisal was clearly a mistake, lol<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Recently, I took my car to the dealership to have some maintenance done. Prior to my appointment, I got a message asking if I wanted to get an appraisal done on my car towards a possible trade in.\u00a0 Considering I\u2019ve already been thinking about a larger car since two kids have already made my current … Continue reading Car conundrum<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[51,79,193,71],"class_list":["post-48680","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-brog","tag-cars","tag-cashmoney","tag-dad","tag-famiry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/totfc.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48680","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/totfc.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/totfc.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/totfc.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/totfc.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=48680"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/totfc.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48680\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":48682,"href":"https:\/\/totfc.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48680\/revisions\/48682"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/totfc.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=48680"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/totfc.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=48680"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/totfc.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=48680"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}