Your favorite car shopping website?

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I am in the market for a minivan.

I went and looked at the Mazda 5 and the Nissan Quest yesterday. Then, in the middle of the day, I had a change of heart and looked at used car, knowing that baseball season is around the corner and the van will likely get trashed

(S. Jersey has a clay/sand mixture that sticks to shoes that I call 'cland'; I foresee the upholstery tarnished within 2 months)

Anyway, I usually use

New Cars and Used Cars are available at CarsDirect.com

and

New Car Prices, Used Car Pricing, Car Reviews by Edmunds Car Buying Guide

but I stumbled across

Used Cars, New Cars, Buy a Car, Sell a Car, Car Dealers - AutoTrader.com

and really liked the way they construct their searches.

For a used car, I plugged in 3 minivans I was interested in (Siena, Quest, and Town & Country) and it produced a list.

None of the other website allowed for a "multi-car search."

Thought I'd see what the forum thought.

[project15]

I like Car information, new car prices, used car values, used car reviews, new car reviews - MSN Autos to do research on cars and read user and professional reviews as well as compare specs.

You can compare multiple cars

[InDebtInDC]

While all of these sites are capable of comparing vehicles on paper, the best way in my opinion is first hand experience. All the features may be the same, but most of these sites do not capture how well the individual vehicle is designed.

For example, GM and Hyundai have advertised against Toyota by comparing a laundry list of options that come standard on their vehicle whereas Toyota makes you pay extra.

What these commercials do not accurately portray is how well built the Toyota is, how good the design is, and how easy it is to repair. These things in my opinion justify the premium.

Mechanical inclination notwithstanding, I like Consumer Guide's used vehicle ratings. They give you a general outline of what the typical repair costs are and some of the common problems people have.

A mandatory used car shopping site is the NHTSA.gov site. It lists all recalls for a particular model. Make absolutely sure that your vehicle is not on the recall list, or at least that the adequate repair has been performed.

Other than recalls, there are also Technical Service Bulletins (TSB). These are available through NHTSA or other industry sites such as AllData, Mitchell's, etc.

TSBs are not safety related like recalls, but TSBs are things that affect the asthetics and/or resale value of the car. Noise, harhsness, vibration, and leaks are the major TSB topics.

Not everybody has access to it, but I like to look up standard repair costs for common items in a mechanic's database. If you don't have access to this, you can call different dealerships and get an estimate for a 30k, 60k, and 90k service for the different models because these are your major services.

You may find that a Toyota that starts out more expensive actually saves you money on maintenance.

In all honesty, nothing beats driving a vehicle and performing (or at least visualizing) some of the common repairs. Something that takes 5 minutes on a Toyota, e.g. oil change, may take 30 for a Nissan.

In the long run these things increase the cost of ownership and affect reliability.

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InDebt,

I hear you - the net is certainly only a tool in the car shopping experience and consideration.

I haven't scratched Toyota off from the realm of possibility. . .however, I have scratched Honda and that "cult following."

Here's why:

1. DW owned a Honda Civic and it ain't all that.
2. The premium for a "Honda" is just too large. $40,000 for a new minivan? The Honda execs. are smoking something and it ain't legal. For $40,000, it better have a hottub inside.

The problem with personal experience and real time shopping is that car shopping and furniture shopping are generally unenjoyable experiences.

It's a shame. We all work and save and when you are finally ready to spend some money on the "big ticket items". . .you can't go enjoy the experience. The salemen yesterday weren't too bad but I am glad to have the net supplement the experience.

[bjl584]

Autotrader.com

[poundwise]

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Actually, I decided to go on leasetrader.com and that proved to be interesting to consider.

After I swore I wouldn't own a Honda Oddysey, I plugged in that and saw someone who wanted out of a lease of about $350/month. It was a close-ended lease and the buyout was $9000 and I would have spent $11,000 in lease payments over about 3 years, a little less if I recall.

I considered the advantages of this:

1. No tax to pay until the buyout.
2. It's like making the downpayment last since the original leasee probably put monty down first. That is, I don't have to put any money down until later.
3. Sometimes, what you are going to pay is fair market value anyway, as this was.
4. A partial to full writeoff for the business.

For instance, for the 2005 Honda Oddysey, with 26K, Kelly Blue Book quoted about $20,000 for a private party sell.

So, in effect I am getting to keep my money upfront, let it earn interest and then put down the $9000 downpayment later while I stuff it in high interest savings or a balanced fund. That's "opportunity savings" as I would call it. And really, it was a 0% lease.

The problem was this person was in TX and I am in NJ.

Boy, you look at some of those leases that people sign and they would have to pay me to assume them. I saw a Grand Caravan for like $600/month and a buy-out of $28,000. The only way I would do that if the lease had like maybe 2 or 3 months left and I just wanted to see if I liked the car.

What were these people thinking?

[poundwise]

What were these people thinking?

I don't think people do a lot of thinking these days. Especially not when they can get "low monthly payments."