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Let's skip the protracted financial situation here and just assume my mom was in a situation where she was supposed to buy a car. Well, she wasn't supposed to do it by herself; we were going to go shopping with her. The budget was $20k, but preferably less. Well, in she comes with an economy car--a 2016 Toyota Yaris LE--that she had apparently spent $24.5k to get. She traded in her old 2003 Mercury Sable for $300. Now, it was a rusted out piece of crap, but we were pretty sure we could have dumped it for $800 on Craigslist without a fuss because it worked and it had A/C. That Yaris is technically the high end of an economy car, sure, but the MSRP was apparently $18.5k. That is higher than what I can even poop out from Toyota's own "build your own car" online app, which was something like $17.9k. let us see what strange things were tacked on that took it to $24.5k: Window tint: $299 Appearance Protection: $759 Tire and Wheel: $509 Windshield Protection: $485 Dent Protection: $699 AM VCP (I have no loving clue): $400 And of course the service agreement. She got herself some more warranty. Mind you, Toyota's have a 3-year fix-anything warranty, and 5 years of powertrain. I suppose I should mention all the tax, but most of that seems legit, although there are things: Sales tax: $1160.75 Dealer Inventory Tax: $36.10 Dealer Documentary Fee: $150 (Texas thing. It's legit) Inspection Fee: $16.75 License/Title Fees: $138.50 Road and Bridge/Deputy Fee: $23.00 Buyer Tag Fee: $5.00 Ultimately, it came up to $24,600. Maybe my wife and I are being unrealistic. Maybe this is a fair price for a car. I do not think so. No sir. But I need to vent somewhere and see if I need to just shut up. In truth, we don't have a problem with the choice of car, just the purchase. Hell, I have a Toyota Echo that I really want to run into the ground because I like the thing. Of particular concern was that there was no method for taking it back. Nothing. Well, we don't know. They tried to say it was law, and referenced something about having three days to return a used car. Nothing is mentioned about new cars. So I ask about policy. They can't seem to find a policy. Did we sign something stipulating? Nope. So disregarding anything else, I was going to put up a BBB complaint just for that.
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Aug 27, 2016 03:24
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| # ? Apr 18, 2024 14:33 |
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MSRP starts at 16-17k so yeah she got screwed.
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Aug 27, 2016 06:12
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It's a poo poo deal for a granny car. It's all the extras where people get shafted on buying cars. There's also a lot of research on the elderly and how they get increasingly gullible over time. Any good negotiation should involve at least two people so it's a shame she went off and got it herself. It don't know what the consumer protection laws are a like outside of New Zealand but we have a 7 day right of return for retail purchases. You may have similar protections and those are rights that can't be signed away.
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Aug 27, 2016 10:37
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Devian666 posted:You may have similar protections and those are rights that can't be signed away. Let me tell you about Texas...
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Aug 27, 2016 15:27
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An extra $2k for out the door isn't too bad, but 5-6? drat son. Did the dealer also screw her into a high rate? edit: my wife went car shopping this week on her own, agreed to purchase a car at a pretty good price out the door, then the final settlement sheet was like $5k higher. Definitely a UDAAP violation. We told them to get hosed.
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Aug 27, 2016 17:16
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adorai posted:An extra $2k for out the door isn't too bad, but 5-6? drat son. Did the dealer also screw her into a high rate? Cash. That part isn't hosed up, but I guess I should explain the "protracted financial situation" now. She has to spend down a portion of her assets to maintain a structure that the elderlaw group is setting up so my father can keep his Medicaid eligibility. He has Parkinson's Disease and was starting to get stuck in place for over an hour, which was a problem when he had to use the bathroom. Add on dementia: he would talk about how he once had a wife that looked like her (he stopped recognizing her as his wife), a man in a top hat was constantly watching him, would forget where the bathroom was, and where he was. He would also try to play CDs on the record player. So we tried to figure out what we should be doing because he was going to wind up in a home fast. They were living on social security and this tiny little pension. I had them set up in a second house I got on a family opportunity mortgage. Previously, they sold my childhood home and moved into a elderly trailer park. They were paying over a grand between plot rent and the ridiculous utility prices in upstate New York. I was trying to get them a landing pad before they hit 100% bankruptcy and it became my problem. So with this plan, my father can qualify for Medicaid and then use a Qualified Income Trust to handle surplus fees with the home he is in. My mom is allowed to have X amount of dollars in assets, but she has roughly twice that now. The firm heavily recommended she buy a car, and I agreed with that idea in general. She has a really bad Yankee car and would soon have problems with that anyways. The other suggestion was to set up a non-refundable bond with a funeral home to handle inevitable expenses when either of them pass away. I also agree with that, but now I want to be there when that happens too because sales are involved, and I know how that goes. People are worried that my mom is going off the deep end, but she really has always been like this. She has no negotiating ability, which is why we wanted to be around for the car purchase--well, for everything. Non-financial life anecdote: When I was a teenager I had a pass from my school to carry my friend's books for awhile because he broke his clavicle. I got the go-ahead from my teachers, but then one of my teachers decided to be a prick about it and started writing me up, locking me out of the classroom, and quickly doing worksheets before I showed up. He then assigned me disciplinary detentions to do those after school. The dean and my parents were flabbergasted. Ultimately, my mom talked to him and told me about this deal she struck. I would do detention, but after the semester was over, I would never have to deal with him again. Um, well, I wouldn't have had to deal with him again anyways. It was a "deal" in that it was exactly what he was trying to do to me in the first place. It just gets worse with money involved. The trailer park thing was also horrible. They had to downsize, but they just had to pick the one method where the house decreased in value and they had no agency to do anything. Grumpwagon posted:Let me tell you about Texas... It looks like it's not even really a Texas thing. I eventually found some FTC pages explaining that there is a cooldown period for specifically door-to-door crap, which I thought was very interesting. So if my mom ever gets gullible enough to let in one of those poor bastards that get exploited into selling security systems every summer, and buys something, there is a federal law to renege that. That being said, she hates door-to-door stuff and if she ends up getting cornered, just says she's renting the place. Used cars do have a cooldown period too. This was overnight, but I think FTC did mention used cars in particular. With the new structure, she can't write me any checks outright to help with the property I put her in. The elderlaw place suggested charging rent, but there was no way she could afford fair market value. We did finally sit down with my accountant and establish a workable structure. If I just claim depreciation and charge rent to cover it, I come out as a wash and won't get heavily taxed on it. If I start claiming mortgage interest and property taxes, then I would be reporting a huge loss and looking like I'm scamming the IRS. This structure is fine by me because I've just been sucking up all the costs of the house at this point. I want to use the rent both to save for future house maintenance, but also to keep a lid on her doing any other shenanigans. Fortunately, the house is working out. It's in South Austin and seems to go up in value by $15k every time I turn my head around. It looks to me like it would take a suitcase nuke going off downtown for it to reach a value less than what we have put into it. As it stands, at the next meeting with the lawyer, I will explain what happened with this car purchase and see if they light up. They take some pleasure in legally punching people in the face because they have to deal with people loving over old people constantly. I couldn't imagine handling any litigation though over $6k. We'll see. I guess if the thread magically closes, you know what happened.
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Aug 27, 2016 17:51
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Can she return the extended warranties and all that poo poo? I would try. She has insurance for a reason, and the extended vehicle warranty is loving worthless (cheaper to pay for repairs later...)
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Aug 29, 2016 23:36
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SiGmA_X posted:Can she return the extended warranties and all that poo poo? I would try. She has insurance for a reason, and the extended vehicle warranty is loving worthless (cheaper to pay for repairs later...) It does, however, use a super-huge battery for some strange reason.
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Aug 30, 2016 06:07
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She got swindled about 5 G but the yaris is not a good car why didn't she get a corrolla. Get her a SA account so she can post on AI.
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Aug 30, 2016 14:15
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You should be able to cancel all those extra service contracts she purchased at no cost within the first 30/60 days and get a full refund. The fine print will be on the back of the contract. Not much you can do about her paying that much for the car though.
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Aug 30, 2016 18:23
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If it makes you feel any better, some dude posted on SA forums years ago about paying some unconscionable amount (low $40,000s) on a lease-to-own Nissan Sentra. Edit: found it! http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=2873673
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Sep 7, 2016 19:34
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| # ? Apr 18, 2024 14:33 |
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LLCoolJD posted:If it makes you feel any better, some dude posted on SA forums years ago about paying some unconscionable amount (low $40,000s) on a lease-to-own Nissan Sentra.
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Sep 8, 2016 14:40
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