We Bought a New Car! Kind Of...

[canyonwalker]

We bought a new car! Kind of. 😂

We decided Saturday on the blue BMW convertible in Encinitas, California. Here's a photo the salesguy snapped:



I say we bought it kind of because the deal's not fully signed yet. And we haven't even seen it in person! 😮 Encinitas is almost 450 miles from here so it's not like we could just pop over for a test drive. We bought based on familiarity with the model, details in the listing and spec sheet, pictures such as the one above, and the level of reassurance that comes from it being a certified used car.

Here's the recent timeline:

• Saturday we decided on the car and agreed on basic terms with the dealership's general sales manager (GSM). We also applied through their website for financing.


• Sunday we had a phone call with the finance & insurance manager (F&I Guy) to review all the cost details (taxes, registration, etc.) and choose a loan option.


• Tuesday or Wednesday we'll formally sign the paperwork. At that point we'll have officially bought the car. The business is old fashioned enough that they still need a wet ink signature... though maybe it's just the state government that's old fashioned and needs a wet ink signature on the vehicle registration form. Fortunately the dealership is part of a large chain, and we can sign the papers at a sister store near us without having to "pop over" to Encinitas 450 miles away.

At some point, though, we do have to "pop over" to Encinitas. The car won't drive itself home! And this is a traditional dealership network, not a company like Carvana with a business model of storing cars in warehouses, conducting business online, and delivering the vehicle to your house via truck. So we need to go to Encinitas and drive the car home.

Planes, Trains, and Automobiles

Fortunately "fly 450 miles away and drive 450 miles back" is totally in my wheelhouse. Even as we were still negotiating basic terms on Saturday I started looking at travel options. We considered whether to fly or drive down in our old car and try to trade it in, which airport to fly to, rental car vs. Lyft/Uber/etc., whether to travel Friday and stay overnight vs. fly Saturday morning, and whether we could fit in some hiking in Southern California while we're down there. ...Whew, that's a lot of choices! Almost more than choosing a car. 😜

We quickly landed on a plan for next weekend:

1. We'll fly down to San Diego on Saturday morning. We chose a 10:20am departure from SJC so we don't have to get up stupid early. The alternative was 6:30am... or even fly down the night before then have to pay for a hotel. No thanks, getting up at 8am for a 10:20 departure with 11:40am arrival works fine!


2. From SAN airport we'll hail a ride to Encinitas, 25 or 30 miles away, as it's waaay cheaper than dealing with a rental car. (Rentals are $85 to $100+ for one day. Though even that is way cheaper than the $350 I paid for my last rental!)


3. We take possession of the car in Encinitas. It should be as simple as we show ID and get the keys since we'll already have signed all the paperwork.


4. We drive home, 450 miles. It will be quite a haul as the first leg of the trip involves driving all the way across the enormous LA metropolitan area in the middle of the day. With traffic and stops the whole drive could easily stretch to 10 hours. 🥵 But if there are no major snags we'll be home before midnight to sleep in our own bed and we'll have all Sunday to rest up.