What now?

[equ]

Congrats.

[wdc330i]

Congrats, indeed. Seems like a solid choice. Details?

[kognito]

Other than my dislike for black (washing,detailing) vehicles, Looks like a great car for your wife. I hope she is happy for a long time

[JST]

Did they let you keep the bow?

[clyde]

Originally Posted by wdc330i

Details?

Thanks, all!

Sorry for the story, but you know me (and this mostly will serve as a future reference for myself)...

I used an abridged and modified version of the "Clyde Method" a described a few months ago in Plaz's Mazda 3 thread. A few things made this different...

I didn't really know what I was going to buy until the last minute. The car I wound up buying was so brand fucking new that people that had placed orders before the first deliveries still haven't received their cars yet. I didn't look for a forum until after I bought the car because I was afraid of getting caught up in details.

I posted a couple things yesterday about how we got to a RAV4 Hybrid and how we decided to go with new, but the process was...uncomfortable.

I searched inventory in the DC/Balt area last night and only found 13 cars. Three were white and two red, the two colors on my wife's "not unless there's no other choice since since we're buying new." Another is a Smurf like blue which would not a preferred color. Black and Magnetic Gray were the two first choice colors for my wife and dark blue her second choice.

Most of the cars were in Virginia and all of them list fees of $799 and $849, which is unfuckingreal. I also did a little work on researching pricing and realized that my initial "just under $27k" estimate might have been a little optimistic. So, I adjusted my expectations and rationalized a bit to get myself okay with a slightly higher price.

Today was also Sunday and the MD dealers were mostly closed and I was feeling distantly concerned of putting myself in a situation where I'd pay considerably more than I wanted to get it done. By noon or so, I'd pretty much resigned myself to spending most of Monday negotiating and hope that I'd have a car by the end of the evening on Monday.

Then I took another look at Toyota's website and clicked through to all the dealer websites and checked their inventories. One of them is a Carmax (one of two Carmax new car dealers in the US, I think)and they were listing a car I didn't recall seeing the day before AND it was a first choice color. They use the regular used car Carmax model with no haggle pricing and a $99 processing fee, but unlike the used car stores, they don't show you the price on the website. You have to give them contact info first. I entered my info and hoped their price would be at or below my adjusted price of $28k. I thought it was a thing where you have to wait for them to contact you, but I was wrong.

MSRP on the 2019 Toyota RAV4 Hybrid LE is $29,744. The Carmax price was $27.8k (including destination) plus their $99 doc fee. Sold.

They didn't email me for about 45 minutes and it was the typical "when can I schedule an appointment for you to come in?" email. I got the email while I was on the way there and responded, "I'm already on my way. See you in 20 minutes."

When I got there, the guy was pulling the car around. We got in, the car had 2 miles on it, we took a 12 miles test drive, he told me it's the first 19 Hybrid RAV4 they've gotten, it just got in, and he wasn't fully up to speed on everything about the car.

It drove...fine. Not annoying like the 2009 Camry my dad bought and my brother is still driving. It's perfectly fine. The lane departure warning and steering assist is interesting. I don't think it's terrible, at least not yet. The dynamic cruise control is neat, but conditions weren't really great to see how it will work in the real world.

Got back to the dealership, went inside and got everything going. Financed on site at a rate higher than I'm okay with (which seems to be a Carmax norm), but will refinance with my credit union at work tomorrow (I hope...they are not the easiest to work with), signed papers and walked outside to see the car with the bow on it. Took about 50 minutes from the time I waked in until I took that pic. The sales guy asked if I wanted a photo of me with the car and I said, "God, no."

---
---
So, I'm happy with the deal I got. In terms of "deals," it's mediocre. In terms of my specific circumstances, I'm pretty happy. I did fully grasp how "new" the car was until well after I got home with it. Dealers have only been getting them for a couple weeks and most are already sold. Toyota has no incentives going for the RAV4 Hybrid right now (and may not for a little while), there's not much to pick from, and the offered price was good enough to get it done. I'm sure I could have grinded something out somewhere in the next two weeks that would have saved me another $500-$600, but that premium was worth it to me to get it taken care of.

For the car itself...

After the pic with the bow (which they did not let me keep), I went home to get my wife. She drove it home, we took one of the kids out for a short trip (to pick up the other who decided she wasn't ready to go home and her friend would bring her home later), and then I took the kid that was with us out to dinner in it. I learned that the car doesn't have some things I would have expected like automatic lights and it does have a physical key you have to take out of your pocket and stick in the column. My Camaro that cost only 2/3 as much has automatic on headlights and a fob that stays in the pocket to lock, unlock and drive the car. But, kinda surprising.

As I said, it drives...fine. I think my wife will love it.

[Josh (PA)]

cool congrats. what happened to the Outback (ie: did you trade it in or still have it)?

[clyde]

Originally Posted by Josh (PA)

cool congrats. what happened to the Outback (ie: did you trade it in or still have it)?

It's in the driveway. If I can get SOA to cover replacing the tranmission, we'll keep it. If not, off to Carmax it goes.

[Biggins]

Congrats Clyde! Toyotas are not all that bad... it should last you guys for as long as you want it.

[robg]

Originally Posted by clyde

Thanks, all!

Sorry for the story, but you know me (and this mostly will serve as a future reference for myself)...

I used an abridged and modified version of the "Clyde Method" a described a few months ago in Plaz's Mazda 3 thread. A few things made this different...

I didn't really know what I was going to buy until the last minute. The car I wound up buying was so brand fucking new that people that had placed orders before the first deliveries still haven't received their cars yet. I didn't look for a forum until after I bought the car because I was afraid of getting caught up in details.

I posted a couple things yesterday about how we got to a RAV4 Hybrid and how we decided to go with new, but the process was...uncomfortable.

I searched inventory in the DC/Balt area last night and only found 13 cars. Three were white and two red, the two colors on my wife's "not unless there's no other choice since since we're buying new." Another is a Smurf like blue which would not a preferred color. Black and Magnetic Gray were the two first choice colors for my wife and dark blue her second choice.

Most of the cars were in Virginia and all of them list fees of $799 and $849, which is unfuckingreal. I also did a little work on researching pricing and realized that my initial "just under $27k" estimate might have been a little optimistic. So, I adjusted my expectations and rationalized a bit to get myself okay with a slightly higher price.

Today was also Sunday and the MD dealers were mostly closed and I was feeling distantly concerned of putting myself in a situation where I'd pay considerably more than I wanted to get it done. By noon or so, I'd pretty much resigned myself to spending most of Monday negotiating and hope that I'd have a car by the end of the evening on Monday.

Then I took another look at Toyota's website and clicked through to all the dealer websites and checked their inventories. One of them is a Carmax (one of two Carmax new car dealers in the US, I think)and they were listing a car I didn't recall seeing the day before AND it was a first choice color. They use the regular used car Carmax model with no haggle pricing and a $99 processing fee, but unlike the used car stores, they don't show you the price on the website. You have to give them contact info first. I entered my info and hoped their price would be at or below my adjusted price of $28k. I thought it was a thing where you have to wait for them to contact you, but I was wrong.

MSRP on the 2019 Toyota RAV4 Hybrid LE is $29,744. The Carmax price was $27.8k (including destination) plus their $99 doc fee. Sold.

They didn't email me for about 45 minutes and it was the typical "when can I schedule an appointment for you to come in?" email. I got the email while I was on the way there and responded, "I'm already on my way. See you in 20 minutes."

When I got there, the guy was pulling the car around. We got in, the car had 2 miles on it, we took a 12 miles test drive, he told me it's the first 19 Hybrid RAV4 they've gotten, it just got in, and he wasn't fully up to speed on everything about the car.

It drove...fine. Not annoying like the 2009 Camry my dad bought and my brother is still driving. It's perfectly fine. The lane departure warning and steering assist is interesting. I don't think it's terrible, at least not yet. The dynamic cruise control is neat, but conditions weren't really great to see how it will work in the real world.

Got back to the dealership, went inside and got everything going. Financed on site at a rate higher than I'm okay with (which seems to be a Carmax norm), but will refinance with my credit union at work tomorrow (I hope...they are not the easiest to work with), signed papers and walked outside to see the car with the bow on it. Took about 50 minutes from the time I waked in until I took that pic. The sales guy asked if I wanted a photo of me with the car and I said, "God, no."

---
---
So, I'm happy with the deal I got. In terms of "deals," it's mediocre. In terms of my specific circumstances, I'm pretty happy. I did fully grasp how "new" the car was until well after I got home with it. Dealers have only been getting them for a couple weeks and most are already sold. Toyota has no incentives going for the RAV4 Hybrid right now (and may not for a little while), there's not much to pick from, and the offered price was good enough to get it done. I'm sure I could have grinded something out somewhere in the next two weeks that would have saved me another $500-$600, but that premium was worth it to me to get it taken care of.

For the car itself...

After the pic with the bow (which they did not let me keep), I went home to get my wife. She drove it home, we took one of the kids out for a short trip (to pick up the other who decided she wasn't ready to go home and her friend would bring her home later), and then I took the kid that was with us out to dinner in it. I learned that the car doesn't have some things I would have expected like automatic lights and it does have a physical key you have to take out of your pocket and stick in the column. My Camaro that cost only 2/3 as much has automatic on headlights and a fob that stays in the pocket to lock, unlock and drive the car. But, kinda surprising.

As I said, it drives...fine. I think my wife will love it.

Congrats- yeah that's strange about the traditional key. You'd think it would be cheaper for them to just use the keyless fob for all cars at this point. I don't always love the new Toyota/Lexus look but I think it kinda works on the RAV4 and prefer it to the previous gen.

[ff]

Nice! Congrats.