The financing people at new car dealerships know a lot of alternative financing routes that you can take advantage of. They will also, most likely, have a much better selection of cars for you to choose from thus increasing your chances of finding a great vehicle for your specific needs.
No matter where you go to find your car, be sure to stand firm and stay within your means. DO NOT let anyone talk you into buying a car that you either cannot afford or are not crazy about. There are a bazillion other cars you could fall in love with. Be willing to walk away from the car if the deal doesn’t meet the criteria you laid out earlier. Your ability to negotiate a great deal will increase by leaps and bounds.
Perhaps most importantly, get the vehicle identification number (VIN) which is usually found on the drivers side dash through the windshield. When you have the VIN, you can find out a lot of information about your potential car.
Log on to www.carfax.com and enter in the VIN. Once you do, you will have a complete history on the car including all previous owners, whether or not it has been wrecked, and much more information. Knowing this can make a difference in whether or not you buy that particular car.
This author cant stress this point enough. I personally had an experience where I went to purchase a car from a dealership. The salesperson told me it was a program car which can mean a variety of different things it could be a dealer car, a rental car, or an executive car among other things.
The salesperson assured me that this particular car was a car used by executives from the car company to use and that once it hit a certain amount of miles, it was offered up for sale. She said that it was used in a large city about 60 miles to the west of where I lived.
I wasnt completely convinced that I wanted to buy the car because of the payment. They were a little higher than what I wanted, but the car had relatively low mileage, was in great shape and it seemed like a good deal. I took the car home overnight and decided to buy it before I went to bed. Had I known about the Carfax report, I would have never signed the papers.
As it turned out, the salesperson lied to me. My car wasnt driven by a car company executive west of my town. It was a rental car in a major city 300 miles south of my town and it had been wrecked.
I would never have questioned this until I began having some major problems with the car just three months after buying it. The problems I was having were not consistent with a car that was that new, and the dealership wasnt willing to make good on all the problems I was having.
The moral of the story is to do your research. If youre not sure about a car purchase, DONT DO IT. Trust your gut instinct. Look very carefully at what youre going to buy and make sure that what the seller is representing the car as is the complete truth.
This will save you a lot of headaches and insure you have a positive experience when buying a car.
You may also want to ask a mechanic to give the car a good once over to see if there are any obvious problems you should be concerned about. Have a mechanic in mind and take the car to them preferably on your test drive.