Car loan... how to do this?

[Juvysen]

Hi... we're having our third child and believe it's time to size up our car. We currently have a 2004 pontiac Vibe that's paid off and a toyota yaris that is one year old and we have a loan on, but are not upside down in that loan.

We're planning to probably buy a van... but here's the thoughts...

Should we:

1. buy an older minivan that we can pay off immediately, drive it for a couple years while we save for a newer van that we can then drive into the ground (or drive the old one into the ground and then buy a new one that we can drive into the ground...)

2. buy newer, take the loan (which we CAN afford, but would prefer not to have) and just drive that car as long as we can.

We're planning to sell the yaris and keep the vibe so it'd be trading one loan for another or a loan for no loan, I guess.

DH thinks that we'd save money just going with option 2, but I'm not convinced. What do you think?

[sunnysandiegan]

I'd have to see hard-core numbers before making a decision like that. Have you looked in your area for the above scenarios? Do you have a ballpark figure you are willing to spend in both options? What is your tolerance for car repairs? Who fixes the cars in your family?

[1growingsprout]

Personally I would get a new van... I just not a big fan of used vehicles and car repairs with a baby...

[Juvysen]

We'd probably spend around $18-20k on a newer van or $6-8k on an older one. At least those were the ballpark figures I had in my head after looking around a bit.

Car repairs are done by a local guy who is AWESOME, but we hate dealing with repairs. FIL sometimes comes and helps us with car repairs.

ETA... we probably have about $1500 we'd get from the yaris trade in. The vibe is in great condition, so we have no worries on that.

[sunnysandiegan]

Good info.

I am not familiar with vans, so the next questions are based on the likelihood (or not) of needing a lot of repairs. Are you looking for a specific make and/or model? Have you looked into the maintenance and repair costs (trends) for the ones you are interested in?

Then, do you have the cash for the used van now? Would you be willing to sell your Yaris private party for a potentially higher price than trade-in at a dealer? Are you willing to buy a used van from a private party for a potentially lower price than a car dealer? The markup at a dealer is worth it for some people, but it is a cost savings to avoid them. Depends on your comfort level with buying and selling vehicles and dealing with people, etc.

[Red Pajama]

I absolutely love shopping for used vehicles. If you purchase a van that is at most 4 years old, you let someone else take the hit for depreciation, and yet you get a van that will serve you well in the years to come. Your yaris, if you'll trade it in, will probably have nice trade-in value, since it's little and trendy.

My favorite thing to do when searching for a new vehicle is to go to edmunds.com and use the "find my car" feature. You enter your zip code and what you're looking for, and any number of vehicles come up. You can specify particluar makes/models/years. There are customer reviews, so you can find out what people love or hate about that particular van.

Here's the kicker. When you think you've found the van you want on the lot, you come back to edmunds.com with the particulars for that van. Enter in that information into the "find my car" feature, and see if the actual car you you're looking at is listed online. If there's a price on line for the actual van (vin number matches) they have to honor the on line price. I saved $4,000 off of a used van this way.

If the actual van you want isn't listed online, or isn't listed at a killer price, pretend you already have the van and plug in its information into the "sell my car" feature. It'll tell you what it's worth-- as a trade in, as a private sale, and sold to a dealer. That tells you about how much the dealer has into the van, and gives you a bottom start point for your negotiations.

Have fun. Other rules, of course, are to negotiate the trade-in separately from the purchase of the van, and to be prepared to walk away. Leaving empty handed is strategy, not defeat.

Here's the link to edmunds.

http://www.edmunds.com/

[mnnice]

I would think about seeing if you could get three narrower car seats in the back of your Vibe (radians?) and keeping the cars you have. It would be tight, for sure (maybe too tight).

You have two fuel efficent decent cars I think I'd try to keep them both. (Can you tell I'm not a van fan?)

BTW I also have a 2004 Vibe and a DS named Oliver.

[Juvysen]

Thanks ladies. I just found out one of my best friends from high school committed suicide today, so I'm not really in a place to respond to most of the questions, but...

Originally Posted by mnnice

I would think about seeing if you could get three narrower car seats in the back of your Vibe (radians?) and keeping the cars you have. It would be tight, for sure (maybe too tight).

You have two fuel efficent decent cars I think I'd try to keep them both. (Can you tell I'm not a van fan?)

BTW I also have a 2004 Vibe and a DS named Oliver.

We have 2 radian car seats and have considered keeping the Vibe (which I'd love to try)... but... our kids like to fight/kick each other, so I'm not convinced it'd work out well. We'd need a car-top carrier, too, because we can barely fit all our stuff in the vibe when we travel as it is (especially if traveling for christmas or going camping... it's insane)... but i've considered the idea of renting a van for such times. Maybe it'd be the smartest choice.

[Logan's Mom]

Originally Posted by 1growingsprout

Personally I would get a new van... I just not a big fan of used vehicles and car repairs with a baby...

:

[Juvysen]

Red Pajama... thank you so much for your advice. That will be very useful!

sunnysandiegan...

no, I haven't looked into how much repairs it would be/cost. I will definitely look into that. Thanks! We don't have cash on hand for the used van, now (as in, today) but we would by the time we bought it. We have a good sized budget surplus, but our immediate concern is saving up for the home birth which will be a couple months (so we leave ourselves a decent cushion for things like home and car repairs and emergency other stuff) and then we save up for the van. I expect to have 6-8k for it by late winter (or at least that's the plan). We would consider private party stuff. We bought our vibe that way, but it was from someone we knew. I'm not sure my husband would be too interested in doing it again, because it was a lot of PITA to get all the paperwork lined up properly.

[mnnice]

Sorry about the loss of your friend.

I think rent a van for your first road trip might also be a good idea to find out what model of van you might like the best.

DH rented a Vibe for a business trip and liked it which is part of the reason we ended up owning one.

[sbrinton]

When I was pregnant with our third, I thought we'd get a minivan. My husband didn't want one so we decided to fit all three carseats in the back of the subaru. It works, but the kids are constantly fighting. I guess this would happen in any vehicle (at least on those days) but I wish I could separate them. There are many days I want to call my husband from the car when the kids are being mean to each other and BEG for a minivan. I also wish I could sit in the back with them to help with eating snacks or breastfeeding when it's too hot/cold to be outside.

DH is coming around and we're thinking about a minivan now too, especially as we're planning to have a fourth (via adoption) over the next few years.

If you look on consumer reports or other sites to check the reliability of minivans, you'll notice that the Honda Odyssey and Toyota Sienna are MUCH BETTER than every other van out there. You do pay more, but you can expect those vans to last many years and probably a hundred thousand miles more than other vans.

Our plan is to buy a minivan that is 3-6 years old that has up to 100k miles on it and has been taken good care of. I think we'll spend between 8-15k. I'm hoping this van will last us 100-150k miles (or 5-7 years). I don't want to get a new van with little kids because inevitably they will make a mess of it. I'm guessing that by then there will be better hybrids and electric cars AND the boys will not be so messy so it would be a better deal to buy a new car.

[sunnysandiegan]

I'm sorry for your loss.

I think you could go either way with a van and be fine. I also think doing without a van is also a good idea. It really depends on what your family lifestyle is and how much effort you want to put into a vehicle. You could put the baby between the older two to create some space.

I personally chose two small cars, but we have one child. I have lots of friends with two or more children and some chose minvans and some didn't. Some of those who did have now traded those minivans in for something smaller. The one family I know with four kids have a Honda Odyssey and it has been a total lemon from the get-go. Such a shame, too, because they did their research and it is reputed to be so reliable, etc.