(USA here)

I've been incredibly disappointed with the VW Taos. First model year. Replaced the head gasket, brake pads, several other recalls already. I'm getting very bad vibes from the car in terms of how much I'll have to spend on it in future. I've only put 24K miles on it in 4 years.

I'm looking at some 2021 BMW x3s xDrive30i Sport Utility 4D between 40-60K miles. All quite similar with clean Carfaxes.

What does your gut say about whether I'll end up paying more in maintenance over the next five years? I know it's an upgrade in performance etc but I'm most concerned about reliability and maintenance.

(And yes, I'll be doing a PPI)

For clarity, this was a purchase through Amazon Auto for a Tucson Hybrid.

Made the order on Saturday night and made the deposit and got the congrats email and all. Was told I’d get a follow up email and documents to sign in a few hours. Selected a 7PM pickup which was the only available time.

Right before going to bed, an Amazon associate emailed me saying they’d call about details by noon. I was going to be busy in the morning so I said I might not be able to take a call but to email me if I don’t pick up. I’d be free 1pm onwards. I also asked if an earlier pickup was possible after 4pm.

They confirmed and said they’d try asking the dealership.

Next day I get some voicemails that the order was cancelled from both Amazon and the dealership and that they’d refund my deposit. Amazon associate wrote an apologetic email saying the dealership said the car wasn’t available and the associate offered to give extra support in confirming availability if I make another order for a different car.

I found another car that wasn’t the color we originally liked but was still within the range we wanted at an extra $250. I asked whether that one was available. I also asked what might the reason be for the car not being available (sold earlier but didn’t update their inventory listing? didn’t want to sell to me?)

They checked with the dealership and surprise that one wasn’t available either. Also gave a vague answer saying they didn’t have that car available for sale anymore. They provided 2 other links to cars of the same model but $700-900 more expensive (grey fabric over black fabric and car color were main differences). Said I’d think about it but probably would pass.

Couple hours later I see the car listed again on Amazon Autos (was removed earlier even when my order was cancelled). The 2nd car was still listed. They both still take orders. I email again asking what’s going on and if the cars are available or if it is an Amazon or dealership error. They said they’d get back to me so I’m waiting on a response.

What might actually be going on?

My two guesses:

1 - Dealership and/or Amazon is really dropping the ball on keeping inventory up to date on the website.

2 - Dealership is not wanting to sell at those prices especially with looming tariffs. The price looked great - my more local dealership quoted 4k higher for the same car and specs and balked when I showed the Amazon quote from another dealership. Told me immediately that was too much of a difference and that they could not compete with that price. If it matters I was looking to pay in all cash.

Local dealership was 38k OTD, Amazon was 33.5k OTD after $2300 incentive.

As the title says my wife and I got approved for Honda Financing Saturday with a decent rate. Two other loans were applied for with other lenders that had a worse rate. I’m currently waiting for my car to come in, go through inspections and get tinted before signing papers and taking possession of it, about 10 days from now. The terrible and volatile state of the economy got me thinking; What is the likelihood that Honda or any other lender can take back that offer for approval? Does that happen often or ever? The deal hinges on this rate as I promised my wife I wouldn’t go above X rate which other loans have. Thanks in advance.

I barely drive my personal car due to having a work van. I’m basically trying to get ideas. I owe 26k as of now with 650 monthly payment at 6% APR with 48months left 23’ civic. Credit is subpar 680-700 with years of excellent payments. I’m upside down of 6k originally. My car is worth 22k according to KBB. Maybe I’ll get lucky on getting 20.5k-21k trade in. And possible rollover to a vehicle worth about 10k-13k. I’m trying to stay under 20k with my negative equity. In the end I don’t want an outrageous car payment for a vehicle I barely drive. What are your thoughts? I’m not very smart on these rollover equity. I take constructive criticism very well. My other idea was to leave in the hood and let GAP handle the rest if all other options fail. I can handle the payments due to having a trade skill and was planning rolling over to a vehicle that will sit until the weekends come around. I just want some ideas and some jokes to relieve some stress too! Thank you!

Hello dealership people! I am currently transitioning to a new dealership at the end of the month as General Manager and partner. I just wanted to check in with those of you working at dealerships, what would you want to see from a new GM? Is there any ideas you'd say would wow you as a new GM takes over?

Any input is appreciated! The current team has a store family vibe as there are about 15 employees in total. I want to make sure they know I'm here to work alongside them and I am invested in starting on a good note.

Thank you so much!

Should I just lead with here’s the best offer the other guys had, if you can beat it by x or y I’ll take it?

Scary because I'm in this situation and I messed up and sighned paperwork of payment and dmv without receiving a copy and luckily didn't leave a down payment. I didn't drive the car off the lot but they have my social and information even ran my credit. The dealership has been lagging saying it's fixing some issues in the car and they'll take the down-payment before i drive the car off the lot. Even scarier I been tracking the vin online and found it listed for a higher price somewhere else days after . I've been calling the dealer though recording conversations screen shooting proof and getting as much information as possible Worse case scenario im getting a lawyer and sewing for all the stress and unprofessionalism they've caused. Is there anything I can do ?

In the market for a new car and have been to many dealers this week. All the dealers I’ve been to, I’ve tried my best to negotiate on the price of the vehicle but that made me wonder if I’m an A*shole for doing this? Do other people bargain too?

This is my first car and I’ve only ever seen my dad doing this before.

I currently have a 2020 camry LE. At the moment of the buy (Aug 2023) I didn't have anyone to advise me and didn't know reddit yet.

I came to realize that the total finance amount was was 27,359 after putting 3k down at 31k miles. Now it has 59,400 miles. ( I drive a lot between school and work, 100 miles a day give or take)

I now realized that I made a really bad deal to myself and I'd like to know what's best to do now.

Original loan: APR: 8.24% Financed: 27,455.71 Down: 3k Months: 78 Monthly: 455.81 Owed now: 21,801.61

Refinanced: APR: 7.61% Fixed rate of 6.84% Financed: 22,871.26 ( I added GAP) Down :0 Months: 78 Monthly: 373.84

Plan 1: keep paying 456 monthly putting the difference to the principal and any additional to the principal until pay off.

Plan 2: do plan 1 until brake even and try to trade it and negotiate better on a newer car.

If you have any suggestions please let me know as "Plan 3:" and I'll really take it into consideration.

I still have no one in reach to learn how to do this, but now I know I have reddit. Thank you for taking the time. I tried to explain everything as much as I could, but if you have any questions let me know.

Hello everyone! I'm considering buying a Tacoma, as I need a smaller size 4 door truck for my use cases. I'm kind of a stickler for the "creature comforts" like leather seats, 360 camera, ranch hand, bed cover, etc so thought a limited with relatively low/moderate mileage was best with around $30k budget (plan to finance).

I found a pretty good deal on this taco, and was wondering if there was anything I should be concerned about towards this listing, anything I should ask the dealership themselves about the truck, and any general advice that y'all had when buying these types of vehicles mechanically? I've also put more details about the truck below, in addition to the link.

Also, I'm hoping this doesn't get written off as a "buying/choosing post" as I am mainly just trying to gauge, mechanically, what I should be considering when buying used trucks in this particular category (red/green flags?), and again, what I should ask the dealer. Thanks!

2020 Toyota Tacoma Limited Double Cab RWD
66,318 miles
278 hp 3.5L V6 engine
Clean Title - 1 Accident reported - 2 Previous owners

with the 25% tariffs cars are getting expensive which will most likely mean less car buyers. Is it possible that car dealers would have to lower them back down because they will not be enough people buying cars?

So I go into a dealership and they have a very competitive sell price for a vehicle I’ve been looking at, but they had $3000 of aftermarket ad-ons. It’s the usual door frame film, the security anti-theft, nitrogen air / towing service and catalytic converter etching. I knew that most of this stuff is optional and I wanted specifically inquire about reviewing the contract of the anti-theft system to see in writing if it is optional. They were giving me a hard time, so I finally just laid it out to them that I know the anti-theft system is most likely optional so can they can either give me a price breakdown with out it included or start financing so I can review the contract of the anti-theft system. I even noted that the online listing had vehicle had an optional $1,785 of dealership installed equipment.

They came back and said they can remove the aftermarket ad-ons, but they are just going to increase the price of the vehicle of the same amount of the ad-ons thus making no difference. It didn’t make any sense in my head and felt like a big red flag so I ended up walking.

Is this a typical sale practice?

TLDR; dealer gives final price with ad-ons, went to negotiate that I do not want any optional ad-ons, dealer took off ad-ons, but only to increase sell value of the car by the exact ad-on price. Is this normal?

Hey everyone,

I’m considering purchasing a 2020 Acura RDX AWD with just over 170,000 miles on it. The price is lower than most others on the market, which makes sense given the mileage, but I’m wondering if it’s worth the risk.

From your experience in the business, do high-mileage 2020 RDXs hold up well? Are there any major mechanical red flags I should be aware of—especially with the AWD system, turbo, or transmission?

Appreciate any insight from the pros here!

Going to play out as much info as I can so my trusty internet strangers/friends I haven't met yet can possibly help steer me correctly.

One week ago my 2018 Jeep Cherokee trailhawk lost its ability to drive. I'm told this is due to failure of the transfer case and was quoted $3600 to repair. There is no warranty.

Vehicle details are as follows: Black Cherokee, 105k miles, I currently owe $17k at a disgusting interest rate of appx. 14%. I bought this car as an emergency because my Nissan Altima, two years ago last month, had its transmission fail and I was in a bad spot. Now I find myself in an even worse position.

Credit is 500s due to a few cards being at max and student loans that I thought were frozen but was not the case, and I'm working on an IDR plan now.

I spoke with friend of a friend who is employed as a salesman, his back office team valued the trade at $7k, leaving $10k negative equity if I was looking to trade. I have about $1000, maybe $1500 available to Me, so I can't just up and fix the vehicle, but also the salesman is looking for around $3k down and I just don't have it.

I don't know if it's better to figure out how to fix the vehicle, but then I'm putting serious $$ into a vehicle that has had oil and transmission fluid leaks and is sitting at 105k miles. If I did this and something else hapoened, I'm incredibly screwed. Conversely, sales guy wants to put me into a GMC Terrain, 2022 with 15k miles priced around $25k. But there's the negative equity and my car payment would go from $460 to probably somewhere at or over $800, when it's already difficult to make the $460.

I absolutely need a vehicle and cannot rely on public transportation for myriad reasons, most important of which is my children and transporting them to school and activities.

TL:dr I have a dead Jeep Cherokee that I owe $17k on, has been valued at $7k as is, and need to determine if I should pursue the fix and make payments while taking risk of another major repair, or trade in now and take a massive hit via the negative equity. I am fine with any constructive criticism, I just need to hear from people who don't want to see a father doing his best get the screws put to him.

Went to a Toyota dealer the other day to check out a used Lexus they had for sale. The cars tires were bald and cracked, the car had dog hair all over it, windshield wipers were trashed. It’s been on the lot for a month, they keep dropping the price. This is a ~50k car, why not even try? Just something that ended up in trade and they’ll auction it off in another 15 days? Will dealers go way down on something like this?

I’m 20 years old and just got a new job taking home nearly about $1700 weekly. I’m looking at a 2015 Chevy 2500 with 64,000 and there asking $31,000 my main concern is I have zero credit history and want to know what kind of interest I can expect to be paying? I have a decent amount in savings so I can comfortably put $10-12k down on it. Any advice is appreciated!!

My Santa Fe lease end is coming up in October and the buyout price is $16K. With the current Tarrif War between US and Canada, can Hyundai bump the price up and make me pay more? Should I buy the car now?

California. I just got a recall done on my 2022 Ford Maverick last week. When I was looking at the paperwork I saw the address was wrong, I looked at previous invoices and the one before has the wrong address and the one before that one has the correct address. Should I let the dealership know about this mistake or can I get in trouble for signing off on the invoices with the wrong address? I don’t know why they changed it in the first place.

Wondering if I should buy now before tariffs really hit and drive up prices or wait a bit and maybe consumer sentiment being so poor and other recession factors forces prices down.

Estate has a 2019 Maybach S560 to sell. Extended warranty.

How best to sell it, or should I say, have it sold (by someone else)?

This is in SF Bay Area.

is it possible to finance a $10k car at 19 with $0 down and a 650 credit score? hoping to pay no more than $200 a month as well. i currently live in texas.

I could use some advice. I only have 4k saved but want to put a down payment once I get down to Florida on a used car. Any advice on what I should do? I feel that I do not have enough saved before I can start worrying about buying a car but I’m going to need one in order to work. I’m graduating college in New England in May so I have little time left. I plan to have my father and uncle with me when I go and look for a car at a dealership since I’m young and don’t know much about cars

Guys, so I'm looking to buy a new mazda3. I am attaching a window sticker from one of the cars. As you can see they list $39,640 total price but my question is how much can I realistically expect to bargain that price down? What amount of money would be reasonable go get off that price $500,1000,2000? What was your experience buying a new car?

We're moving from NJ to NY in 3 months but wanted to buy a car now because of the tariffs. Since we're going to only get about 6% of use out of the registration, it's frustrating to have to pay for the entire 4 years up front. We're selling our old Honda Fit before we pickup the new CRV hybrid, and I was hoping the plate transfer might get us out of the fee, however everything I'm reading says they need to be in the same class to transfer plates and the CRV Hybrid is juuuust north of the 3500 lb cutoff between the Fit's class 7 and the likely CRV's class 8 registrations.

Is there a way to avoid paying out the full 4 years? I thought about applying for refund, but the NJ DMV Refund form is very specific on what's eligible and this is not one of the scenarios. Another thought I had; could the dealership give a temp tag and not register the vehicle for me, and instead I do the registration myself in NY state before the temp tag expires? I'm going to talk to my dealer when I go to pick up the vehicle, but want to go in informed of any possible options, so your help is very much appreciated.

Edit: Thank you for all the responses. To add, if whatever workaround I use requires me to pay sales tax in NY instead of NJ, then the question is moot as the higher NY tax is more than the higher registration cost in NJ.

Also, after some further research, it appears I was confusing NJ registration "code" with "class". While my cars may fall under different "codes" assigned by weight less than or greater than 3500 lbs, they are both the same "class" of non-commercial passenger cars. Thus I should be able to transfer plates and just pay the difference in registration cost between the code 7 (<3500 lbs) and code 8 (>3500 lbs)

So just kind of wanting to have an outside opinion without “rose tinted glasses” if you get what I mean, I currently have a 2021 Colorado with 14,500 miles on it in my local Chevrolet dealership just got a ZR2 with the diesel in on trade that I’ve been really wanting to switch to and really should’ve held out for in the first place but however, I let the new shiny toy syndrome get in my head and I bought the one I currently drive and I was wondering if I should make the switch the ZR2 is a 2022 with 22,000 miles on it the dealership is asking 42,000$ I do currently have about 7500$ in negative equity I’d be rolling over, I believe I’d be able to keep my payment about the same with some negotiation currently at 7.49% APR and will be bringing a pre approval letter from my credit union I suspect I will be right around 6-6.5%. Any advice is appreciated even if it’s just telling me that I’m stupid for even considering the deal!