Okay, this should be fun ... let’s learn from my mistakes. Bring the pain!
Three weeks ago, I bought my first brand new car (and just my 3rd car in the past 21 years — cars were never that important to me, clearly). Pre-apocalypse I had been planning on buying something new this year; but come March plans quickly changed. And then come July, they did again ... when my prior ride (which I’d long since stopped pouring money into) finally threw a rusted off caliper and took the brake line with it. Suddenly, I had a car that couldn’t stop, so I had to start shopping for that replacement.
I had zero idea what I wanted. Buy new? Buy used? CPO? Lease? Not a clue. Just knew I wanted something relatively new (2017 and up) that I wouldn’t have to worry about for a while. I didn’t even know if I wanted a sedan or CUV (I was leaning towards a mid-size sedan because of the better performance and gas mileage (especially with the hybrids) and the presence of a secure trunk; but also considering small SUVs for the easier in and out, and loading of dogs and cargo, and possibility of crashing in the back when I was road-tripping and didn’t want to burn time and money finding a hotel for just five or six hours...
Step one: rent a car for a week.
Step two: Take care of prior obligations that weekend.
Step three: Start scouring the internets in every remaining waking moment for educational resources to help make the above decisions and narrow down my choices ... get a bunch of different insurance quotes so I could factor those variables into my decision making process ... and run credit reports.
Step four: Visit every damn dealership in 30 miles ... except GM — f—k those guys.
Figure out what my options are. Explain I’m not interested in talking money yet; I just want to sit in a bunch of different cars and SUVs, in as many different trims as possible (generally, starting with the base trim, moving up to the most popular mid-level trim, and then the fully loaded one for each model). Figure out which ones I can quickly rule out based simply on aesthetics or ergonomics and which ones I’d like to consider test driving (I wanted to keep the latter group to four or five).
I wound up test driving 3. I had a clear favorite by this time, so step five was to go back home and get back on the internets, run more numbers, scour reviews, and figure out why I SHOULDN’T buy the car I was leaning towards. At this point, realized I’d left one contender out of my search because the closest dealership was further away then the others. [Spoiler Alert: it was Mazda]. One quick look inside and right away I knew I had a new favorite. But, dumb ass that I was, I’d forgotten my license so couldn’t take one for a test drive. After doing my sit in all the different trims, play with the gadgets thing, Sport (nice, but lacking), Touring (not bad), GTR (very nice) ... Signature — Nope, no Signatures on the lot ... I had no choice but to make a one hour round-trip to retrieve my damn wallet.
Well, I return and test drive the GT(PP) I ultimately bought. I didn’t want to test drive the GTR unless the GT felt as anemic to me as the Nissan Rogue. I’ve gotten enough fast driving awards in my life. I’d already figured out both my fuel and insurance costs would be significantly higher with the bigger engine considering my driving history (I’m a professional skydiver, base jumper, and fly really fast wings ... I’ve never raced professionally but I can’t help but imagine every back road as a rally stage and every congested freeway as my own personal Talladega ... and none of the bad cars I’ve owned or been provided by over the years slowed me down much. Definitely the GT isn’t all that quick off the line but it isn’t annoyingly slow; and ‘feels’ perhaps more responsive than it really is. It’s fun. I can make it work. So no need to spoil it by teasing myself with the turbo. And, I like the colors better. The GTR was parchment. Ugh.
Step six. Seven? Whatever: I like the car. They know I like the car.
Oh, the 2020 has CarPlay. Hmm.
I get some specifically ‘Out the Door’ quotes (new vs lease, and also on the 2019 CPO out front). Cash buyer.
Decide, f—- it, let them run my credit for the 0% thing. If that goes through, I don’t have to waste time figuring out which of my banks will give me the best deal. If I buy used, I’ll still have to do that. And the insurance is higher (for some reason). Buy used or lease, I’ll be paying interest. Lease, and I’ll have to sweat over mileage. Gah! Easier to buy new! And I haven’t slept in four days, and my rental car is due back the next evening (or I’ll have to rent it another week — that’s like a wasted car payment!)
Approval goes through. Avoid the temptation to sign papers right then and head home to once again run all the numbers, figure out why I shouldn’t do what I’m now convinced I’m going to do, and set up an insurance policy with the specific VIN.
I get some price advice from Consumer Reports, KBB, Edmunds, True Car. (Unfortunately didn’t discover this forum yet, or the ones on reddit). Think I know what a fair price is. Still fuzzy though if the prices they give include the doc fees or not. I had assumed not. I might have messed up there?
So I have the dealer’s offer from the day before. I ask them to nix the $199 VIN etch. Then I briefly explain the research I did and make what I felt was a reasonable counter-offer. They come back with a number that accepts about 80% of the discount I asked for. It’s in line with the numbers I have; better than (my understanding of what is) average. I like the car. Figure they likely aren’t making anything on the back end since I’m at 0% and declining all the extended warranty / gap coverages etc ... and will be doing my own oil changes and such.
Maybe I can save a few more bucks if I make a big show of leaving unless they give me what I want, but I just can’t be that a—hole on that day.
I visited a lot of dealerships in a furious three days and met a lot of different sales people. I met a bunch of d—-s and two who I really liked and would liked to have bought a car from. I felt these guys played me straight (or at least, they were much better at making me believe that than their competitors) and didn’t jump on me from the moment I entered the place to upsell this and upsell that.
Lol — even after I bought the thing I couldn’t get them to try very hard to sell me after-market parts I actually wanted (sun shade, cargo tray, etc.)
Also, there was the matter of returning my rental car ... which meant someone had to follow me 30 minutes to the town I had to leave my rental ... and then let me drive them back to the dealership. Maybe that’s a normal service included when buying a car (free delivery?) but it was helpful and appreciated none the same. So, f— it. I paid what I did.
Now ... understanding it was only the 8th day of the month, and 3 months into a hard shutdown and we’d just started opening up again ... and I didn’t really have time to walk away and think it over for a week or two or wait till ... well, whenever you all might have known would be a better time to buy ....
I bought a brand new 2020 CX-5 AWD GT with PP (Deep Crystal Blue Mica and Black) in Hunterdon County, NJ — where I work and where my previous car decided to finally die at an inopportune time.
[I have a house in NY but an apartment here. I guess I could have bought and registered the car in either state (which meant I also had to shop insurance in both places, and balance NY’s higher sales tax versus NJ’s higher doc fees) ... it was all enough to make my head
.]
4 Miles on the Odometer when I started my test drive!
Sticker MSRP was $34,435.
$31,710 GT-AWD
+ $1,625 options (1GT Premium Package)
+ $1,100 delivery
= $34,435 Total
Including their “Mandatory” dealer doc fee of $449, and after just that one round of offer / counter-offers, I agreed to the somewhat random price of $32,967.30 (before state tax, title, tag, and tire fees).
I wasn’t eligible for any rebates and had nothing left to trade in. I financed through Mazda Financial at 0% for 60 months (with the no payments for 90 days).
I focused on the out the door price; as opposed to monthly payments or whatever. If I paid way too much, it’s because I didn’t understand what all makes up the “fair market price” ranges in the sources I looked to. Such as, do those include the doc fees?
TL : DR
2020 Mazda CX-5 AWD GT with GT Premium Package • Deep Crystal Blue Mica & Black
4 Miles on the Odometer.
$34,435 MSRP
Paid $32,967.30 (+ New Jersey Tax, Tag, Title, Tire)
I particularly liked the part about how you went into this open minded, not even knowing what you want and through it all Mazda was the choice. 
