I'm in Love...
My car will be paid off in April. That's good. My car is now 8 years old. That's bad. My car needs about $800 of work in order to pass inspection, which is up in April. That's very bad. Alex has been telling me for a while that I need to think about getting rid of my car because Volkswagens do not age gracefully (at least the newer VWs) and it'll be expensive to fix. I've found that out already, having put over $2000 into my car over the last 2 years because things have broken. I'm thinking that he's right and it's only going to get worse.
What's a girl to do? I don't have a lot of money to spend on a car and I don't think that I want to buy another used car that I'm going to have to keep sinking money into to maintain. So, I'm going to try leasing my next car. Since my daily commute is incredibly short - 4 miles round trip - I'm not worried about having to buy more miles for a lease or about going over my miles when it's time to turn it in. And it will be nice to have a new car with lower payments than buying. I've been looking for the past few months and have been having a very hard time deciding what I want. I still love, love, love my Beetle. It's the most adorable car ever. I really don't want to go from fun, adorable car to boring sedan or horrible mom-mobile.
I first started looking at Mini Coopers, but I might hold off on getting one until I'm old. I mean, I want to have kids in the next couple of years and a lot of what I read during my Google-ing indicated that car seats don't fit well in the back. I can hold off on a Mini until the future kids are out of the house. It's OK.
Then I started to look at hatchbacks. I tend to think that hatchback vehicles are adorable and I love that they are kind of sporty and not sedans. I looked at the Mazda3, which was very cute and scored high marks stylistically with me. I also looked at the Subaru Impreza, which had a unique and cute looking "butt" but the front of the car just looked so sedanish. Also, the inside was just sort of blah. Even though it didn't do much for me style-wise, it's still in consideration because it's 4 wheel drive and I live in the Northeast and there's about 8 inches of snow outside right now. I looked at the Nissan Versa, which I loved because Hiro on Heroes kept saying "Nissan Versa" and sounded very cute. It is very cute and I can get it with every single toy I could ever want in a car for not much money at all, but I was a little "meh" after the test drive. Something about it felt small or cheap or something.
Last night, we went back to the Nissan dealer and I test drove a Nissan Rogue. I'm in love. It's adorable. It's sporty. You can fit a bajillion things inside it. It feels like a sports car on the inside and not like a mini-mini-van. Unfortunately, it's also brand new for 2008 and the sales guy pretty much admitted that you can't get a good deal on it right now. When I told him that my time line isn't immediate - that I can really wait until April, he inferred that I might be able to get a better deal if I hold off until then. Right now, the only thing they have going is a lease on the All Wheel Drive with floor mats and Splash Guards for $249 a month for 24 months. That's only $20 more a month than I pay now, so totally doable, but I sort of want more toys... The Rogue that I drove last night was the "maxed out" model with a moon roof, Bose stereo system with audio controls on the steering wheel, Bluetooth, and Intelligent Key (which allows you to keep the key in your pocket and unlock and start the car and is super hella cool). It even had paddle shifters on the steering wheel, so even though it was an automatic, you could manually shift if you wanted to and right on the steering wheel like a race car or something. Cool. The sales guy estimated that a lease on that model would be over $360 a month. No freaking way.
So, I'll wait. I'll shop around. I'll keep trying out cars. I'm not in a rush. Hopefully, I'll be able to get a better deal on a Rogue in the future, and if not, I can always lease the base model. I just need to decide how important the toys are. Although, I still think the intelligent key thing is awesome. Totally unnecessary - I mean, you still need to dig out your keys when you get home anyway to get in the house - but cool.
