Car Shopping in San Diego

On a sunny weekday afternoon, my two boys, 18 and 19, drove around Kearny Mesa and Miramar looking at cars. Our first stop was to see a 2005 Porsche Boxster. It's currently listed on AutoTrader.com and it is the cheapest '05 Boxster I've seen. It does have 55K miles, but I was hoping to get my oldest son a test drive.

I went to visit the dealer over the holidays. They were closed and weren't going to reopen until after the New Year. What struck us funny about this car was it's location. The dealer's building and parking lot are next door to a strip joint, Deja Vu Showgirls.

From there, we headed over to the Smart dealer. We saw this Cayman for sale on the way.

It was listed at $49,160, matching it's Kelly Blue Book Retail Value.

There's currently a glut of 2008 Caymans. Base models are going as low as $39K. I've seen many Cayman S in the mid $40K's.

We get to the Smart dealer, it's inside a Mercedes dealer. There were 3 models inside. A base model called fourtwo Pure, $11,590. A mid range, fourtwo Passion, $13,590 and a soft-top convertible, fourtwo Passion Cabriolet, $16,590. The sales lady said I can buy one of the 2008 models on their lot or order a 2009 version, listing for $400 more. She said they'll sell the 2009's at 2008 pricing. I asked what kind of discount I could get on taking a car off their lot, which is already a year old. She hesitated, then said we'd could get $200 off.

Huh? $200! What kind of idiot would accept a $200 savings, when it's costing him at least $2000 in extra depreciation. I left after that.

And now for an experiment:

Comments

[Erwin Calverley]

Those are very beautiful cars you have there. It's good that you know a thing or two about vehicle maintenance. The sales lady clearly did not know how to close a sale.