State of Automotive Indecision

So with the old car declared a total loss, it was time to find a new one.

Bewildering Variety of Options

I had no clue what make, model, or brand I wanted.

I knew I wanted a small, serviceable car and my husband thought we should get a newer small SUV, like the one we already had. It was kind of a better gas mileage versus more space thing, with a bit of "I want a pony" child-like desire thrown in by each of us.

But the last two times we'd bought cars we just went to Saturn and picked up certified used. We started there because there was no haggling and it turned out we liked the models. This time that wasn't an option. And after our frustration with repairing both the wagon and Vue we might not have gone even if GM hadn't closed the brand down.

We went to four major dealers, toddler in tow, and looked at sizes and styles and price ranges and what kinds of things they had on their lots.

We looked at the newly issued Consumer Digest report, online ratings at a couple different sites, and talked to friends and family about their cars.

I was considering one particular car, but didn't like the online information. The SUV idea got bumped off when we got a more accurate monthly payment estimate than the original tool we'd been using.

And somewhere in there we narrowed down sharply to Toyota, even with their recent difficulties. A Matrix if we could get one, but probably a Corolla. The Prism had been a Corolla, after all, and my husband's parents had bought multiple other Toyota cars over the years with great success.

One of those smaller brands might have been perfect for us. But we didn't have the time or motivation to find out unless we ended up at a Carsense or Carmax with many brands of used cars in one place.

There was logic behind our choices, but in the end it was something of a mental trick in response to a self-imposed deadline. We wanted to get this nonsense over with and buy a car that weekend, provided that the total loss decision was made before we got there.

Lessons Learned

Reputation matters. Price matters. Word of mouth matters.

It's fascinating to look back and realize that I and we made decisions on emotion, even though we tried to put some logical underpinnings in there. Many of the influencing factors that I've read about in books came into play, although I wasn't exactly thinking about them at the time.

My daughter loves looking at cars, by the way. I thought she'd be bored but she had FUN.