Well since Harry got his inheritance, besides the down payment for a house he wanted to buy himself a "newer" Truck. He went back and forth between Dodge and Ford and finally settled on a Dodge Ram 1500 4x4. So he mapped out five different Dodge dealers and we set out early this morning. First one we went to (Canoga Park Dodge) had two Dodge Rams 4x4, lots of 2x4 but Harry wants 4x4. But the only issue is that these were new trucks and were priced $38,000 to $42,000 and well out of our price range of $25,000 to $30,000. Of course Harry sees it and says.. I LOVE IT in front of the salesman. We go on to tell the gentleman that we are looking for more of a used one and a lower price. Well they had one used Dodge Ram but it was in White and that was the one color Harry did not want. So the salesman really wanted to sale us the Truck so we went back to his office and he drew up some numbers. He first came back with a $5,000 off the ticket price plus fees (additional $4,000). Which brought the total to around $37,000 out the door. I told him that it was still to much and that we can't spend more then $30,000. Of course the guy laughed and went back to his boss. A few minutes later he came back out and said.. okay we can give you the truck for $28,000 (that's $10,000 off the ticket price), plus the $4,000 taxes and fees for a total of $32,000 exactly. Well we knew it was a pretty good deal but this was our first dealer and we really didn't want to spend more then $25,000. So I thanked him, told him we wanted to see a bit more but would be back.Next we went to the Dodge dealer in Van Nuys and found out it was out of business. So we moved on to the Dodge dealer in Glendale and they had four or five Used Dodge Rams but all of them 2x4. We stopped for a quick lunch at Sizzler and then drove north to the San Fernando Dodge dealer and found out that it too went out of business. Next we drove even further north to Valencia Dodge. And a side note it was hot in the valley but it had to be 15 degrees hotter in Santa Clarita Valley. Anyways we found the dodge dealer but they had no used Dodge truck. We started to head a little north west to Simi Valley Dodge but I was tired and said instead of us driving around we should all these places and find out if they actually are in business and have used Dodge trucks.. so we headed home. Once home we started to look for trucks online. There were a few but the prices were $25,000 to $29,000 and they had 202 to 30 thousand miles on them. I turned to Harry and said should be just go get the brand new truck as it didn't make sense to spend a few thousands less for a used car. Harry of course said yes so we went back to our first dealer (Canogo Park Dodge) and started the process of buying the truck. Besides the $32,000 cost of the truck and fees we purchased a lifetime warranty for the truck for another $2,060 so in the end we paid in CASH (well a check). $34,060.00 for a 2009 Dodge Ram 1500 4x4.
This was the first time in my life that I was buying a new car but also paying cash for a new car. My heart was racing as I was writing that check for over 34,000 dollars. Of course Harry said just wait, with the house you are going to write a check for $100,000 dollars... great!!!
