i never personally attacked you. I am just going by the things you have posted in the past. Like the last transmission you had to have replaced, you didn't do it yourself either and by your own admission you don't have a place to do a lot of this work yourself. That is not personally attacking. Everyone thinks they are a mechanic today.
That's the point and the danger of buying a well-worn car, you are going to be paying for this work and as a recent usually also for marked up parts.
You are ranting and being defensive. Much like the beginning of summer being a terrible time to buy a soft top, with the recent gas hike all these hybrids have now peaked in price.
There is no way anyone would agree that you spending $2700 on a 450k mile car was a smart choice when you are trying to save major money.
It's great you got the car that you really wanted to get, but at the same time it was not financially responsible as you said yourself.
I am in disagreement, I am not attacking anyone.
Fair enough.
Just hear me out, let me try and explain in detail. I honestly don't think I'm far off base here.
First, I'll clear this up. When I thought about it, I figured your comment was probably because of the things I've had done in shops, so understandable. I am perfectly capable of doing all the work myself. I've lived in Santa Fe for the last 2.5 years, and none of the places I've lived in have had a proper space to do my own work. When I lived in Portland, I did. Another problem is time. If you need your car to get to work, etc.. It is difficult for it to sit in pieces while you work on it on the weekends. Sometimes paying someone to do it is just worth it.
I've also become good friends with another Insight owner/enthusiast down in Albuquerque. He has the space to work on cars, which is why I went down there to install MIMA. He's already offered to help if it needs work.. lol. So that's pretty cool.
Next, I'll ask.. How much do you actually know about the Insight? I've driven one for the last 3 years, and would like to think I'm fairly knowledgeable about them.
We were going to buy an Insight and sell her Civic no matter what. We have been looking for the last month+. We almost bought a $5000 one a month ago that would have been a decent deal. Decided to just wait it out and see if a better deal comes along. We really wanted a green or blue one. The ideal Insight would be one with a recently replaced battery and transmission, all service records and maybe some misc stuff like brakes and tires. Then gas prices started going up, and everyone became hyper aware of it. They started selling faster.. and I got the sense that the cheap ones would soon become harder to come by. So our sense of urgency to buy one went up, because I know how much their prices will spike if gas really does go up to $4/gal.
This one came along, and I jumped on it. Like I said, it's only the 2nd one I've seen under $3000. You're right, I suppose it is a gamble. It's a gamble we're willing to take, though. Remember, if I get it for $2500 it is $2300 cheaper than the next cheapest comparable Insight on Craigslist, last time I checked.
The chances that we need to put $2300+ into this car seem slim, IMO. Remember, this is a one owner car with service records. It's not like he's never done any maintenance to the car, lol. He replaced the radiator 6,000 miles ago. At the same time he replaced every rubber hose in the engine bay, which he said "was not cheap". Brakes were recently inspected and are fine, e-brake adjusted. It will need an oil change not long after we get it home. I don't know the full story though, you're right. It will be very interesting to go through his service records. It could be a gold mine, if he has kept up with scheduled and regular maintenance. I got the feeling that he did, but not really to what extent. For it to have so many miles, it is highly likely that there have been a lot of wear items replaced. He's driven it 1,000mi in the last month.
Let's assume that we
DO immediately have to put $2300 into it, making it a $5000 Insight.
Is that REALLY such a terrible thing? Sure, we will have spent more than we wanted to. But we could have bought a $5000 Insight, which in general will be an older model with "a lot" of miles and still have to potentially replace a lot of the same things. If that does happen, at least we know the parts we've replaced won't need to be fixed again for a very long time.
We could have easily bought a 3+ owner, $5000 specimen and not known any history what so ever. This is a calculated risk, and I'm almost positive we will end up ahead. We will see.
At the very, very worst.. we would have a $6000 Insight.. with a LOT of new parts. Not good for our savings, but a wash overall IMO when you look at the big picture and how much these cars are worth.
The only way that will happen is if the engine, transmission and other bits are toast. If that's the case, I'll be able to tell with a test drive.. and in that case, I probably just won't buy it.
It's going to have to be something REALLY bad for us to back out, though.
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