Buying a Used Truck Part Three - The Silver Tacoma

Marv called me while I was at school and left a message saying that they had a 2002 Toyota Tacoma with only 90,000 miles on it with the "good rubber on it that you (I) like." That's his way of saying that the tires aren't bald. It was priced at $9500. Later that day, Erin and I went to check out this Tacoma.

When we arrived at Tempe Honda Marv wasn't around. He was off somewhere smoking a cigarette. We saw Robert and Marv was paged. As Marv approached, one of his crazy coworkers said, "Here he comes. You can tell it's him. He's the bald guy with the gut." I felt sorry for Marv.

After Marv arrived, we hopped on the golf cart and headed over to the shop where the Tacoma allegedly was being "gone over." It was not there when we arrived, so we stood around outside and had a very nice talk with Marv about his RV and the vacations he and his wife take with it. Erin and I have always wanted an RV, so we enjoyed this conversation.

When the truck returned it looked mint. It wasn't extended cab or TRD, but it was still really nice looking. Marv went over and talked to the mechanic driving the truck. Erin and I got the impression that he looked unconvinced. We went inside and Marv talked to the mechanic for a minute before we took the truck out for a ride.

This part was sketchy as we were unsure whether or not the truck had been check out by a mechanic yet. It seemed to us that the mechanic was taking a preliminary test drive when we got there and his demeanor suggested all had not gone well. We decided to try it anyways.

We had to test drive it separately, as it was only a single cab and Marv had to go along. I decided to go first. I pulled the truck out and it felt OK until I tried to accelerate to about 40mph, at which point it really started shaking. When I got on Route 10 and tried to go above 60mph, it really shook like crazy. Something was clearly very wrong with the truck. Marv said he thought it was a U-joint, which is part of the drive train.

Upon returning to the shop, it was determined that the truck was messed up and there was no need for Erin to drive it. I suggested to Marv that they give us the gold Tacoma, which was still there, for the price of the silver Tacoma and throw in the silver Tacoma's nice wheels. He asked Robert, but Robert said no. They tried to pressure us into buying something, as it was the end of the month and it would boost their numbers, but we said no.

We decided it was time to leave. We were kind of pissed of that they made us drive all the way down there without checking out the truck first. Marv apologized for the inconvenience. As we were trying to pull out of the parking spot, Robert was gesticulating emphatically around the wheel of the silver truck. I rolled down the window and he told me that he had seen a wheel weight fall off and that it was no big deal and probably the cause of the shaking. They said that they would call us about the wheel weight.

Later that evening, Marv called and said it had not been the wheel weight and it was, not surprisingly, something more serious with the drive train. He then told me that, because it was the end of the month, Robert had agreed to come down on the price of the gold Tacoma and set a "rock bottom" price of $9999. I was at school at the time, so I thanked Marv and said I would speak to Erin. Of course, the price drop from $10,250 to $9999 is only $256. I was a bit insulted that they thought I would fall for that silly trick. I later called Marv and informed him that the negligible drop in price was not enough to change out minds. Our monthly payment would still be over $175. I tried to get the price down one more time by citing the fact that they had never adequately addressed the issue of the body damage. As property damage adjuster know, something that looks like a small dent (not that the dent was that small...) can be a costly repair. Marv asked, but to no avail. He said he'd keep looking for a vehicle for us.

You'll notice how frequently I use some incarnation of the word "ridiculous." You haven't heard anything yet. Wait until next time when I write about Right Toyota in Scottsdale!

Buying a Used Truck Part Two - The Man Called Sonny Stubbs - The Saga of the Gold Tacoma

Last time I mentioned how Marv had called us back with a truck. Before I get to that, let me tell you about the Big Two lot in Mesa. After leaving Tempe Honda without the Jeep, we headed to a couple other dealership in the Tempe Autoplex. A nice man at the Hyundai place told us we should check out a used lot in Mesa run by a friend of his. He even tried calling ahead. We did check that lot out, but there was nothing there of interest for us that day.

Across the street from that dealership was the Big Two used lot. Big Two is the name of several big dealerships in the East Valley (all this is taking place around Phoenix, AZ, F.Y.I.). This used lot was ridiculous. There were a bunch of overpriced cars and nothing we wanted. However, we did meet Sonny Stubbs, car salesman extraordinaire. This dude was dressed like cowboy, only he was an African American dude, and he told me that I looked like Mack Truck driver. Obviously, he was kidding, but it was kind of weird. He then tried to sell us on a 1998 Ford Ranger with 120,000 miles for $13,000. We pretty much knew it was over at that point. However, we went inside with Mr. Stubbs anyways because he was so damn amusing.

First he told us that if we want a cheap car we should look in the obituaries. At first I thought he meant Craigslist, but he meant the real obituaries. Again, I'm pretty sure he was kidding, but the concept of check the obits, he explained, is that widows don't know how much their dead husbands' cars are worth so you can get them cheap. Moments later he said he knew where we lived and that he was coming over. Creepy. He does not know where we live. I made a joke that he should bring the beer. I laughed at this considerably.

Throughout our conversation, Sonny kept saying, "Hey, I have just the truck for you" or "I know what truck you'd like," every time he was referring to the overpriced Ford Ranger. He must have done that 5 or 6 times. He was a real character. We both kind of liked him because he was funny and didn't take his job too seriously.


Well, over the phone Marv told me that he had a "nice little truck" for me. We set an appointment for noon on Saturday.

That Saturday Marv called early and encouraged us to go down before our noontime appointment as other people were interested in the truck. We hit horrible traffic on the highway, so even though we left early, we still arrived there at noon. Not surprisingly, the truck was still there.

The truck was pretty nice. It was gold. It was a Toyota Tacoma TRD Prerunner extended cab. It had 91,000 miles and no price sticker. Marv greeted us in his usual laid back manner and we test drove the truck.

The truck drove pretty well, but there was some sort of weird rattling sound coming from the dashboard. Additionally, there was some damage to the driver's side rear quarter panel that extended onto the gate and the tires were bald.

Since our last visit to Tempe Honda, we had read this great article on Edmunds.com called "Confessions of Car Salesman" Our friend Damien recommended that article to us. The article is about a writer who goes undercover as a cars salesman and learns the tricks of the trade. Very illuminating.

Armed with the information from the Edmunds article and years of experience in the insurance industry handling negotiations (mostly Erin's experience), we sat down with Marv to negotiate on the gold Tacoma.

The first price Marv gave us was $13,999. We had previously told him we wanted monthly payments of $130, which is a loan of roughly $6500 at 7% interest. We agreed that we would say that we were willing to put $1000 down. Like any used cars salesman, Marv's manager had given him the numbers. He put the paper down in front of us. I just gave him a ridiculous smile and without us saying anything Marv got up, went to the manager's desk and came back with $12,999, a monthly payment of $249.

I guess I understand that there are some people who don't want to pay a lot for a vehicle, but when faced with a vehicle they want they are willing to pay over $100 more than what they originally intended. We are not those people. Not to condemn anyone, but you'd have to be an idiot to get suckered into that. I hate haggling over prices, but sometimes you have to try.

We began taking apart the price of the vehicle. First off, the price sheet had no interest rate on it. Marv told us he thought it was 10%. This was ridiculous, because there was a sign on the table that said that people with 700+ credit scores would be approved to 8.49. As our credit is in that excellent range, that was the interest rate we expected. We also gently reminded Marv that we were totally unwilling to pay more than $130/month so anything above that was wasting everyone's time.

Marv returned with his manager, Robert. Marv clearly hated haggling even more than us. Marv likes to talk about his family, tell anecdotes about him and his wife, talk about his RV, stuff like that, but not haggle about money. Robert assured us that they were "no-pressure" in a very high-pressure way. Erin says that the "No Pressure" tactic is very passive aggressive. You're intended to interpret their pressure as your own fear of pressure that's not really there. Unfortunately for them, we were not falling for that. Pressure is pressure, even when you call that pressure "no pressure."

Very quickly we had our 8.49 interest rate. Robert sucked up to us and praised our great credit. He pretended to intimate things about the cars sales business to us that we already knew, like how they can jack up the interest rate above what the bank approves you for.

Side note: If you're buying a vehicle and they run your credit and the bank approves your for, say, 8% interest, the car dealership financing can charge you 10% interest and keep the difference. It's totally legal, but really shitty.

Back to Marv and Robert. While Marv looked out the window, Robert came down another $1000. We remained stalwartly unwilling to budge, but we talked sympathetically and played along with the haggling game. Now, with our new interest rate, the vehicle at $230.00. Still ridiculous. Marv got us a Carfax report, which was useless because nothing had been reported in two years and 30,000 miles. That meant the 1/3 of the life of the truck was unaccounted for.

We continued to haggle. Robert told us that the suggested retail value of the truck was $13,295 according to Kelly Blue Book. We countered that we knew NADA to be lower, but Robert said that the West Coast uses Kelly Blue Book and the East Coast uses NADA. I have since fact checked this and found out that he was telling the truth. Still, this truck was a 2001 (7-8 years old) with nearly 100,000 miles, body damage, and bad tires. Not to mention that you shouldn't show people who want to spend $130/month something that costs $230/month because that's not what they want.

Citing the ridiculousness of getting us all the way down there to the dealership for something we can't afford and the damage to the truck we worked the price down to $10,750 and then down to $10,250. We also learned that in certain circumstances the dealership can opt to finance you through a credit union or other bank for a lower interest rate. Our interest rate was now at 7.49%. Robert said that was the best we could do anywhere. We have since disproved that, but I don't think he was intentionally lying. In the course of about 1 hour, we had talked the truck down nearly $4000 and 2.5% interest. Not bad, but the price was still $204/month. Unacceptable. In a last ditch effort to show good faith, we asked to have it calculated if we put $1000 more down, $2000 total, which took us to $185/month. While this is still not doable in our budget, it was more reasonable. Unfortunately, we wasted about 1 hour of our life trying to get to something reasonable. I understand that's how buying a used car works, but I resent having my time wasted all the same.

When it became evident that we weren't going to get the truck, Robert tried to sell us some sort of Ford Explorer thing. Marv gave us a ride over and chatted. I think Marv was glad to be away from the nasty money table. The Explorer was still being cleaned up. It was not what we wanted. We got out and looked at it. Marv looked too and understood it was not what we wanted. Marv is really no pressure. He gave us a ride back to our car so we could go eat lunch. As he was telling us to have a nice lunch, Robert came out and tried to convince us that we were crazy for not buying the truck. He tried to say that we could make sacrifices, like skip Starbucks, to account for the $50 difference between the prices. It reminded me of the scheister at Courtesy Chevrolet who tried to sell us a giant, junky truck.

We shook our heads too, and we were off to get some lunch.

A few days later, Marv called about a Silver Tacoma. Our experiences surrounding that Toyota will constitute the next chapter of our story.

Buying a Used Truck Part One - The Road to Tempe Honda - Introducing Marv

The time has come. Erin and I can no longer exist with only one vehicle. For nearly a year now I have been relying on my bicycle to get me around, but circumstances have changed and now we need more wheels. While we have not actually purchased a truck yet, our attempts to purchase the truck have become so ridiculous that I thought it might be fun to share our experience as we go along, hence this series of blog entries.

When we lived in Massachusetts we would never have considered buying a truck, but now that we live in Arizona, we have found that there are some benefits to owning a more durable vehicle. Since our move, we've really taken up hiking and camping as serious hobbies and there are lots of great hiking/camping areas that can only be accessed with a higher clearance vehicle.

We don't want an SUV. We're looking for something more practical. Our car, a Toyota Matrix, is a great hatchback, so an SUV might offer more room, but not considerably more room. We decided on a smaller size truck. Our favorite is the Toyota Tacoma. Our ideal vehicle is a 2002-2004 Toyota Tacoma TRD Prerunner extended cab. They have great clearance, decent gas mileage for a truck, they hold their value well, and they look rad. The one pictured above obviously has a serious lift, but even the regular Tacoma Prerunners have good clearance.

We have become quite savvy shoppers. However, let me take you back a couple of weeks and catch you up to speed.

One Saturday a couple weeks back, Erin heard an add on the radio that a Nissan place on Camelback Road was selling repo-ed vehicles. We went over and the inventory was pretty picked over, so we headed across the street to Courtesy Chevrolet. We told the salesman who was "helping" us what we were looking for. This man took our request very seriously. We said we didn't want to spend a lot of money, so he lead us to a lot about 1/4 of a mile away to a lot that looked like a junkyard. He then tried to sell us sundry jalopies, including but not exclusive to a busted Land Rover, some sort of a V8 Superduty, and an employee's Tacoma TRD. This was our first introduction with the Prerunner TRD. Love at first sight...

Needless to say, we did not buy a truck at Courtesy Chevrolet, even in spite of the salesman's assurance that we were making a big mistake in not paying $12,000 for a giant, junky truck that was probably intended for the auction.

Erin and I then headed over to Tempe Toyota, which is where we bought the Matrix. They were nice enough when we bought the Matrix, so we thought we'd try them again. They were still very helpful, but they didn't have anything in our price range that day.

Next we headed next door from Tempe Toyota to Tempe Honda. Upon arriving we were greeted by a friendly older gentleman named Marv. Marv has become an important and ubiquitous figure in our lives since then, so let me begin my drawing a character sketch of our friend Marv.

Marv is retired. He retired from a very successful business career, moved to Arizona, got itchy in retirement, and so now he sells used cars at Tempe Honda...for fun. Marv is the best used cars salesman from the buyer's perspective because Marv doesn't HAVE to sell you the car. If you don't buy anything, no skin of his back. He's just happy to chat, which is cool because he's fun to talk to. He does try, only he's honest, so his trying is actually helpful. However, we have noticed that Marv's honesty and nonchalant demeanor exasperates his sales manager. This is also a good sign. Erin and I are tough customers (literally) and instead of getting frustrated and giving up on us, Marv says he admires us and he tries quite hard to get us what we want! Marv's the best.

However, our first ride with Marv was ill fated. We found a 1999 Jeep Wrangler on the lot of Tempe Honda and it was reasonably priced, so I decided to try it out. Only problem was that it was a manual transmission. Erin doesn't drive manual. I haven't driven manual in probably 8 years and I was never any good at it in the first place. Nevertheless, I hopped in the driver's seat, Erin climbed in the back, and with Marv riding shotgun I lurched and jerked my way around around the block. It was not a comfortable ride, but I only stalled it once and the clutch survived. We did not purchase the Jeep. Marv was very reassuring during the ride, but when we arrived back at the lot he did not seem to hold the same hope for the improvement of my shifting skills he displayed during the ride. Perhaps his confidence was a survival mechanism more than a sales technique...

After we parked the Jeep, no one could figure out how to remove the key from the ignition. They put the thing in all the different gears, messed with the emergency brake and the clutch, turned it off, turned it on, pushed in on the key. At one point there were 4 people trying to get the key out including me. Finally, I noticed that there was a button behind the ignition that you had to push in and we removed the key. It was ridiculous.

Marv took our info and it wasn't long before he called back to tell us that he had Toyota Tacoma TRD Prerunner extended cab. However, I will leave the saga of the Tacoma for my next blog entry.