Looking for a new car – time to downsize! I made a list of the things I really had to have. On my list were bluetooth to hook up to my phone, backup camera and navigation. The navigation was probably the one that was a little negotiable, but the others were on the list of can’t live without. I had a couple others like keyless entry that I would have loved to have, but they weren’t on my drop dead list.
Personally I love getting a new car. I hate spending money and usually change my mind at the last minute, and I don’t like negotiating, but I love having a new car. I originally decided on the Toyota Highlander. I really loved it! I currently have a Town and Country Van that had all the features I wanted at the time. It isn’t great on reliability though, and it is huge with low gas mileage. While hauling around several kids and waiting (at the time) with a kindergartner in the car it was worth it.
Now I’m ready for a smaller more efficient car. After deciding I really didn’t want to shell out the premium for the Highlander – it was more for the same features! I started looking at the Nissan Rogue. Our local dealer had a couple that seemed possible. The one I was looking at though had obvious water condensation in the back light, making me wonder about it. It was on my list though. It had all the features I wanted, but our local Nissan dealer wouldn’t negotiate. I then thought I’d check another Nissan dealer – that didn’t go well. They also wouldn’t offer a reasonable deal. 
Finally we tried a Chevy dealer and although the car wasn’t exactly what I wanted I was able to check off my have to haves. The dealer negotiated and we were able to come to an agreement. Surprisingly I called the Nissan dealer while at the Chevy dealer to give them one last chance to make a deal and pointed out I was going to give the Chevy dealer a check right then if they couldn’t give me a good price. Would you believe they quoted what they had as the sticker price! What a joke! I’m thinking Nissan is on my never visit again list, no matter what features their cars have. I ended up driving out of the dealership with my Chevy Equinox. I bent on some of my nice to haves, but got my have to haves.
The navigation is supplied through On Star – which I wouldn’t recommend if you don’t have a backup system. So far it doesn’t seem exceedingly reliable, and you have to speak to a person every time you want to put a map on your car (apparently mine has a glitch that won’t let me send to my car from the app)…. But I did get a really cool remote start, USB hook up in the console, and a few other features I had never thought of. It has a lot of scaled down features – which actually makes my hubby happier, but like I said it has my must haves. I love my bluetooth and backup camera!
Although I would have been happy with a Highlander or a Rogue, I found a dealer that was willing to negotiate and don’t feel taken advantage of like I would have with the Rogue (the Highlander was just higher than I was willing to spend).
I should add that one of the Nissan dealers here kept asking me when my husband was coming in? Apparently I wasn’t able to negotiate for myself? (I will add that my husband had been in the day before and seen the car, and we do share decisions) I think he asked me at least four times before I told him that if he asked me one more time he would never see me at that dealership again. Even after that I still gave them a chance, this was the dealership that quoted sticker price as their bottom dollar!
