I had to walk up my driveway 5 times over the course of last winter and while I am totally capable of walking up the driveway, it is scary to walk up such a steep hill with say, a baby and some grocery bags, along with the diaper bag and my purse. I vowed after that last walk and that scary slip that I would have an SUV before the next snow storm.
I called and got the payoff on my current car, a Jetta BTW, which I have loved and still love, but can't make it up the hill in the snow, and went to the dealership. I chose to go back to where I got the Jetta because they were really nice and seemed honest and so on. Well, my salesman told me that I shouldn't purchase then (it was December) because everyone was buying SUV's and I should wait until the spring when people weren't thinking about snow and the gas prices had started to increase. I thanked him for his advice and left.
I have been watching the gas prices and car prices ever since and yesterday I hit upon the perfect option! It is a Jeep Patriot. It is a 2010 so I can get new car financing which will spread the length of the loan out and get the interest rate low enough to get the payment were I need it to be. It only has 25,000 miles on it. It gets 23 MPG in the city (the Jetta gets 26) and it has 4 wheel drive!! I called the bank again and not only got the new payoff amount on the Jetta, but got pre-approved for the loan amount that I want (which is to say the loan amount that gets me the payment I want).
I headed back to the dealership, hoping and praying that I would actually like the look and feel and drive of this Jeep. I fell instantly, deeply, madly, in love with this car!! It is kind of boxy, like the classic Jeeps were before they got all luxury with rounded edges. It is comfortable inside without feeling too over done and functional without feeling sparse. I was sucked right in to the comfortable seats and roomy feel. I had to have it.
So, I called Smug-Hub and had him meet us a the dealership when he left work. The first thing he said was that it was butt ass ugly... I was offended about the way he was talking about my new love, but I let him drive it and told him all about the great features. I think that he actually liked the feel and the ride and the way it drove, but he doesn't like the body style, which is the thing that I like a lot!
Then he starts asking the salesman about the 4 wheel drive, which is after all the main reason that we are looking at an SUV at all. The salesman tells us that this doesn't have a limited slip deferential so it would just lock up instead of transferring power from the wheel that is slipping to another wheel to get you through the snow and ultimately up the hill.
Well, I was crushed! Here I thought I had found the perfect vehicle and the 4 wheel drive wasn't the right kind of 4 wheel drive!! So, the salesman is going to look and see if there are any Patriot's in the Limited version (those have the right kind of 4 wheel drive) and see what else he may have on the lot as well as check into what they would offer me on the trade and everything to see if we can get to the right price.
I am not giving up, and I want to research this limited slip differential thing more and see how important it really is in the ability to get up the hill before we move on to something else.
The problem is that we have a limited range of movement here. We need to stick with a 2010 or 2010 in order to get the length of the loan and in interest rate that gives us the right payment. If we go with something older, then it has to be a whole lot cheaper to get the payment to come out right and then you also run into the issue of probably more repairs needed on an older model. Also, all the other SUV's that I have looked at get like 13 or 15 MPG which would make the cost of running the car higher. This really was/is the perfect car with everything I am looking for. Now, I just need to convince myself that I will be able to get it up the hill...
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