After 10 years of carlessness (7 years spent living in Boston at the mercy of the MBTA, and 3 years spent living in the inner ‘burbs with my husband and his Civic at my mercy), it appears that, for career advancement purposes, it is time for me to procure an automobile of my own.
Last week I did some research on buying cars. I read about gas mileage and safety features and financing, but more important, I wanted to know how to psychologically outwit the car salesmen. It is common knowledge that car salesmen are tricky, thieving, commission-hungry predators who operate with a lesser set of morals than the rest of us, and I won’t be swindled out of a couple of thou by a textbook ruse. So I did some Googling and the first page I found said, “You can forget about psychologically outwitting a car salesmen. You buy cars maybe once every 5 or 10 years; they sell cars everyday. ”
Petrifying. But we weren’t going into the car-buying process blindly. We had a pretty good idea what we wanted to buy: A 2010 Volkswagen Jetta TDI Diesel. We had a back-up choice: 2010 Honda Civic Hybrid. We had a good idea of what each should cost. And we were pretty confident that our driving passions would not be aroused by a mere test drive to the point where we’d acquiesce to the smarmy charms of a car salesman.
Our first stop was at a Ford dealership, to check out our cheapest, economical choice: the Ford Focus. It was 9:30am and the collective sales force seemed a smite out-of-sorts, as if they had spent the night on couches covered in empty beer cans. The most easy-going salesman ever took us out to the rainy car lot and tried to muster enthusiasm about the Focus. “It was popular during Cash-for-Clunkers,” he said repeatedly. We took a test drive. The sterile dashboard of the Focus was depressing. Each bump on the road rattled my teeth. After talking the Focus’s economical virtues to death, the salesmen fell silent as I drove. Hell, he might of fallen asleep. After returning to the dealership, we quickly made an exit.
At Honda, we fell into the hands of a tall, suave salesmen with an arm tattoo poking out from under his cheap suit. We came in asking to see the new Civic Hybrid, and he immediately tried to sell us a used 2007 Hybrid with 50k miles for $16,000. Obviously, he was trying to press his luck straight away. When we rejected this ridiculous offer, he began to tell us why we didn’t want a Hybrid. The real reason was that they didn’t have any in stock, but he pulled up a software program that purported to show us that we’d pay more upfront for the Hybrid then we’d save on gas in the next 8-10 years. Since there were no Hybrids in stock, we test drove a regular Civic. Not bad. Roomier than we expected, with okay performance. The salesman projected such an air of confidence that we would buy the Civic that he seemed too stunned to put up a fight when we said that we’d think about it and left.
Next stop: Volkswagen. A tall, older man cornered us the second we entered the dealership. At first he appeared to be kindly and rather befuddled, but as he talked to us I realized that he was a career car salesmen, intent on handling us the way that a baker handles dough. He did his job well. We did fall in love with the 2010 Jetta TDI, and we were rather apprehensive when he repeatedly reminded us that he only has 1 in stock. But the more we resisted his charms, the more aggressive he became, and the more I wanted to leave. He kept going to talk to his manager and I got the feeling that his desk was bugged. Since we weren’t buying that day, he seemed as eager for us to leave as we were.
Finally, we went to another Volkswagen dealership so that Mr. P could test drive the Jetta TDI in manual. To my relief, we were approached by a female saleswoman. She was younger and had an expansive townie accent, giving me the (mistaken?) impression that she couldn’t possible swindle us. When we went for the test drive, she turned up the radio and didn’t mention half the attributes that the previous salesman mentioned. But she exerted no pressure on us, and praised us for not rushing into such an important decision. That’s the sort of tricky psychology that I like: Flattery!
So we’re sold on the 2010 Jetta TDI Diesel. Now all we have to do is buy it…
