car shopping

I like the reasons that the people on CraigsList give, explaining why they are selling their cars. The reasons never have to do with a car breaking down a lot, although some ads list all the things recently fixed or replaced, maybe on the theory that those things add up to x% of a new car or at least THOSE won't break. Maybe it is all car shop mechanics selling those cars. Because mechanics say it to a customer at the shop as she pays a big repair bill, and she doesn't argue with them, so they don't know she disagrees. "Well, look at it this way: you replaced a BUNCH of stuff. So it should run great for a while!" She hopes they are right but mostly doesn't want to burst into tears if they are persuaded agree with her that they are wrong.

If you saw a car ad that said "new brakes, spark plugs, spark plug lines, cv joints, starter, radiator, battery, heater, and front axle" would you think "HOT DOG! That's about half a new car right there!" or would you think that you can't really blame the person for not saying "I am sick of spending money on it and I want a car that doesn't break so often," but they might as well have?

One lady was selling her car because it was "too purple" for her job. She explained (on request) that people did not take her seriously at her job if she was driving a very purple car...but perhaps I had a different sort of job which it would not impact. Um..yep. I wanted to ask more about her job but did not. I might have been able to say "so I gather you are not unionized" without laughing but I doubt it. That one looked like a pretty good car actually, but somebody else bought it. He had on big floppy shoes.

A man was selling his car because it did not have air conditioning, and he was moving to a hot place with his baby and needed air conditioning. (Baby=object de amor? or baby=infant? I don't know. Baby needs a new pair of sandals... AND a frigid blast of supercooled air.) Another man loved his car, wouldn't be selling it, but there just was not enough headroom for him because he was a big guy. Well, it is possible. I could ask to see photos of himself, smaller, wearing modern enough clothing to support they were recent photos, right? To show that he had been smaller recently.

After you look at CraigsList long enough to get an idea how much stuff is selling for, then you can look at car review websites and see what people say about different types and years of cars. One website only has good comments. Read that one; it will lift your spirits.