Comments on: Dances With Dinosaurs

By: Ivan-Assen

Ivan-Assen — Sun, 31 May 2009 14:45:56 +0000

Great writing, excellent read, unfortunately, purely theoretical for me.

Could you please kindly move to Eastern Europe, live here for a couple of years, and write a similar piece called “How to import a decent used car from Germany” ? Thanks!

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By: Andrew

Andrew — Fri, 29 May 2009 12:31:13 +0000

I read this blog with great interest primarily because it’s like a real life “Stuff White People Like” without the irony or the “kidding on the square” as Al Franken calls it.

But I have to say that this was a really useful article that I will reference when it comes time to look for a new car. I also hate shopping for cars and have about the same objective – to leave not feeling like I’ve been taken advantage of. Thanks!

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By: peterb

peterb — Fri, 29 May 2009 12:05:32 +0000

Edmunds has some good articles on when and how to use a car broker or car concierge:
http://www.edmunds.com/advice/buying/articles/103283/article.html

http://www.edmunds.com/advice/buying/articles/132526/article.html

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By: Julie

Julie — Fri, 29 May 2009 04:09:23 +0000

I’m with psu. Where do you find such people?

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By: psu

psu — Fri, 29 May 2009 02:41:56 +0000

You can pay people to car shop for you? Amazing!

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By: Nelson Minar

Nelson Minar — Fri, 29 May 2009 02:37:31 +0000

I learned a very valuable lesson at age 21 buying a new car. It was the first time I did business with another human being where I had to first realize the other person was actually out to cheat me. A thieving, evil person not acting in my best interest. Good lesson for a dewy eyed college student.

For my most recent car I had an auto broker buy the car for me. I paid him $500 up front, then he did all the legwork and negotiation for me and called me back a day later and said “you can pick up your car”. It was very civilized, and I think he probably saved me about $1000 over the deal wI could have gotten, so he paid for himself.

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By: psu

psu — Fri, 29 May 2009 02:21:38 +0000

The dynamic between seller and buyer with respect to the price of the car continues to fascinate me. It seems to be driven by the fact that cars are both very expensive but also mass produced commodities. So the result is that some negotiation on price is “required”, but no one can stand the idea that they might not have gotten as good a deal as the last guy or the next guy.

It seems like this should be a solveable problem, but we might be too far gone. The Edmunds site does seem to help with this a lot. I wonder when its prices will start to be used as the de facto street price.

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