The "The Search For A Ride: Part I" Story

Toyoto Rav 4

It was an ordi- nary day.  Heading to our grandson's baseball game when my cell phone rang.  It was Bruce calling to see if we might change our mind and buy the Toyota Rav4 that we had driven earlier in the day.  We sat with him for what seemed like an two hours or more listening to deal after deal that he was offering.  Even told us that they called someone who came to look at our car and offered a few thousand more than he had originally offered to us.   He was a true salesman going after the kill.  The Rav 4 was the 4th car that we had driven in the past week.  We are trying to decide if we want to keep the Mercury Mountaineer that we love, but only get 12-13 miles per gallon, or buy another smaller SUV that gets double, or in some cases, triple the gas mileage.  We have had the Merc for almost eight years and it will be tough getting rid of it.  Years ago Carol was in an accident that totaled our miniature Chevy Sprint when it was rear-ended.  

Honda CRV

Carol was luckily not hurt, but wanted to drive a larger car from that point forward.  So we bought larger cars since then for her to drive.  Our Mount- aineer is a large SUV with room for seven, leather interior, heated seats, 10-way power seat controls, dual temp controls, etc.  So we now are trying to duplicate most of that while paying as little as we can.  Don't most car buyers operate like that?  Read recently in the AARP Bulletin that Baby Boomers, which Carol belongs to, are creating a surge in the car buying market.  Also said to have the spending power to buy the cars.  And, they are going after the smaller SUVs, pickups and compact sedans.  So we fit right into most of those categories.

Mazda CX-5

 They listed the top 10 models purchased by age 55 and older as:  Ford F-series pickups, Honda CRV, Toyota Camry, Honda Accord, Chevy Silverado, Ford Escape, Honda Civic, Chevy Equinox, Toyota Rav4, and the Nissan Altima.  We decided to use the list as a guide and chose the CRV, Escape, Equinox, Rav4, Buick Encore, Mitsubishi Outlander Sport, and Mazda CX-5 as our choices.  Looked at all but one and drove quite a few of them and am now trying to make a choice of one of them, or keep our Mountaineer.  The salesman can make or break the car buying experience for us as was the case this time.  We have narrowed our choice to 4 favorites and will decide soon.  It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.