Scraps of my Life

Brian with his “Sassy” new to us, Ford truck.  His color choice would have made his Dad proud, LOL!

OK…Car shopping in North Dakota is completely, COMPLETELY, different than shopping for cars in Nevada.  I think we purchased 6 vehicles over the 18 years we were in Nevada.  Those that we purchased from dealerships (all but one) involved all kinds of games with the sales person…can’t get a straight answer on the price of the car you are looking at, can’t/won’t work with you, want to hold your car keys/title, etc.

We got to the dealership in Bowman at 10am.  Brian had done some poking around the dealerships online inventory.  We looked at the used cars on the lot, so Brian had an idea of what vehicle(s) he wanted to look at.

The sales rep, Josh, talked with us about the vehicles we were interested in…he wrote down the year, model, mileage, and their price…then he went to the key box and handed us the keys for the four vehicles we wanted to look at further, and told us, “Here, go have fun, check them out, test drive them, and come back when you are done.”

HUH???  He doesn’t want to accompany us on the test drive? He doesn’t want to see our Driver’s License? He doesn’t want to hold the keys to my car until we return?  WAIT??? YOU ACTUALLY TRUST US????  WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU???

Josh was cracking up! He said, look, this is a small town, I have a limited customer base and I have to be able to look these people in the face after they complete their purchase…we don’t play games around here.

Brian and I test drove the cars and just as I suspected, he had already chosen his car before he ever sat in it.

We returned to the dealership, having already checked the Kelley Blue Book on the car (Thank God for Blackberries)…and the price they were quoting us was $100 (yes, one hundred) over what the Blue Book price was.

Brian and I decided to finance half the cost of the car, so we didn’t have to deplete our savings totally! Their finance company didn’t want to finance it because of the vehicles age and mileage.  So in the midst of dealing with this, the dealership owner walked in (we thought he was another salesrep!) and said to tell the finance company that they, the dealership, would co-sign the loan (?!?!?!?)…well we got our loan! LOL!

Yep, buying a car in North Dakota is COMPLETELY different than buying one in Las Vegas…and you know what…I would go back to that dealership in a HEARTBEAT!!!!