Recently, we here in the Prestidge family have completed some of our young family's largest financial transactions. The latest: a time-intensive, obsessively-studied, viciously-negotiated car deal. Here's how it happened:
For a number of reasons, CheyAnn and I decided to "downsize" to one car. In the small town of Williamsburg, VA, I'll be about 8 minutes from the law school, and we really just don't need two cars. So, we set about the great hassle of trading in two cars, our well-loved Mazda and Tundra, for one.
At the risk of making a long story become a long boring story, I'll just say that we shopped around and decided to target a Volvo XC90. Safety & size, really.
So, of course, I obsessively started searching the internet for "the one." After months of this, when we were finally ready to make moves, we actually visited 4 dealerships, test driving, comparing, and narrowing down our options. The difficulty though, was that we needed our trade to come out dead even. After learning the hard way with the Mazda, we were both committed to basically never finance a car again. So we shopped with that rule in mind.
At the Volvo dealership, we really fell in love with a well-cared for, high-mileage XC90. So, after a test drive, we sat down and punched some numbers. Not too fun. The sales guy and the manager came out and came out with an offer sheet: they wanted $7000 in addition to our trades! It was so weird how they acted like it was a good deal, but they acted like they expected us to take it.
CheyAnn and I balked and rejected it, and they instantly dropped it to $3800, but we said, "Ok, we'll think about it. See ya."
We then visited another dealership, where a similar ridiculous offer was given. I began to become discouraged, thinking that it just wasn't going to work. But, digging deep into my reserves of resiliency and determination, I fought back by doing what I do best: researching on the internet. I researched everything I could for days—about negotiating, about haggling cars, about car dealerships, car prices, everything. I printed price sheets, I made a list of my own sequential offers and counter-offers. And when I walked in a few days later, portfolio of papers in hand, I couldn't have been more prepared. I had become—The Negotiator!
I haggled. I demanded. I rejected. I himmed and hawed. I said, "My wife will never go for this." I threatened to take my business elsewhere. I went way above and beyond my normally non-confrontational personality and really stuck to it. Inside, my heart was pounding and my hands were shaking violently. But I remained cool and relaxed on the outside, more so than the sales guys.
In the end, I won. We broke even, and I paid a little bit out of pocket for TT&L. And I realized, negotiating is fun! Being so meticulously prepared like that, and wrestling in a battle of the minds, and finally winning, it was a huge rush!
Since then, I've tried to negotiate everything, and it's been working. Thrift store items, Uhaul rental, pair of socks. I'm a negotiating fool and I am getting a serious kick out of it!
After months of shopping and planning, and years of great pleasure, our family said goodbye to our cars, the Baby Bullet and the White Stallion. We'll miss the cars that carried us to college for years, trekked through blizzards, and road-tripped across the entire Western US.
And we said hello to our new Volvo, the Polar Bear! Safe, reliable, with a third row for all the kids going to soccer practice! Our little family is growing up!
