![]() 04/20/2018 at 19:16 • Filed to: None | ![]() | ![]() |
Whenever I buy a car I like to make a little post about my time with whatever dealer I end up buying from, good experience or not. I don’t know if anyone actually wants/cares to read said experience but hey half the internet is useless Hot Wheels posts anyway, right?
So I recently bought a 2017 VW Golf Sportwagen from VW Princeton. I traded a car in and I did a first, I financed the thing *please put your pitchforks and swords down*. I had had enough of my 2003 Toyota Corolla S, it was loud, small, slow, generally pretty beat. I had it for a little over a year as a daily for work and winter but I hated everything about it. I’ll likely never consider another toyota because of how awful the 2003 Corolla was. I’m not rational but that’s another story. I had 3 options really, spend a grand on maintenance for the Corolla, trade it for another used up beater or trade up to something new. My parents and fiance were both pro-something new. After a lot of thought, I decided I wanted another station wagon. The only new station wagon I could realistically afford was a Sportswagen but it’s a really good looking car and I was interested. I ended up finding a 2017 CPO car for $15900 at Princeton VW which seemed like a stellar deal considering a 2018 starts at 21k.
Toyobishi Corolla Evo S
Saturday my father and I hop into the Corolla Evo S and head over to the dealer. We walked the lot and didn’t see it but did see a nice TDI for 17k and a few other slightly pricier wagons. I really started to dig the styling of the MK7 here. After 10 minutes of looking and not finding the car we came for (and not having a desperate middle aged white guy come jogging out) we headed inside and were greeted by a young gentleman we’ll call Shawn. We BS’d for a minute, told him why we were there, he went off to get the keys. In this 5 minute conversation I could tell he was new, a little out there, acting confident but not quite hitting the mark. I took that as a plus, no overly cocky salesman here.
Walked over to the car which I still am not sure how we missed, only black car in a sea of white and silver jettas and golfs. A scuff on the hood and a small scratch on the door but it has 10k miles so nothing out of the ordinary or concerning. I open the door, sit inside and am blown away. This car had to be nicer than a 15 year old economy car which I knew it would be but man, this is a base model that felt premium to me. We took a test drive and I was sold.
Back inside we start talking numbers. First order of business, the corolla and the financing. VW was running a 500 dollar off the sticker when you finance for 72 months at 3.99% apr on CPO cars. The dealer offered $2800 for the corolla, I would’ve been able to sell it for 3 grand max privately so I’m pretty happy with that offer (Shawn tells me he had to plead with his manager because I was dead serious about purchasing the wagon and his manager only wanted to offer $2300, could be standard dealer fibs or the truth, still not sure) I’m prepared to put down 5 grand. The dealer comes back with some figures and my payments will only be $174 a month which seemed very reasonable. Fast forward to right before we go to see the finance manager and Shawn informs me that I can only put down 4350 because I have to finance a minimum of 10 grand. That’s iffy but ok, my payment is up to $180 a month, not a deal breaker. We sign paper work (my father had to co-sign for insurance policy reasons) and I now have a very lightly used VW Sportwagen.
Overall a very positive experience which, given the way most dealers seem to be now, is very surprising. And relieving when a sweaty fat guy isn’t shoving papers at you to sign before you even see a car.
Those wheels have got to go though.
![]() 04/20/2018 at 20:26 |
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2003 Toyota Corolla S
I fully understand this. I’ve never owned one, but I test drove one, and it was by far the worst car I have ever driven. Seems like you came to the same conclusion.
![]() 04/20/2018 at 20:30 |
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I bought it thinking it’d be low maintenance, cheap, durable. Everything about it was so awful though. The only good thing I can say it is reliable. Great for people who are not interested in cars or driving but there’s a lot of other cars that are great for non car people and don’t totally suck.
![]() 04/20/2018 at 20:59 |
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I had a 06 Corolla for about a year. More torture chamber than car.
![]() 04/20/2018 at 21:59 |
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We’ve got some friends that have one in black with some black aftermarket wheels and it looks super nice....
![]() 04/21/2018 at 06:47 |
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manual or auto?
personally i’m not a fan of black.
![]() 04/21/2018 at 06:56 |
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Auto, the mk7 owners seemed to prefer the DSG over the manual.
I really wanted blue or red but i couldn’t find one priced half as good as this. The only other deal I really found was on a silver car and I’ll be in hell before I buy silver cars.