We had big news this week. We bought a new car yesterday. Our old red Honda Accord was 10 years old with a little over 100,000 miles. We decided to replace it with a new red Honda Accord. We expect to pick the car up Wednesday.
Cars have changed a lot in the last decade. We like having a built-in GPS. Ten years ago we had to buy the top-trim level because putting a GPS in a car was an expensive proposition. It required a special design of the dash to accommodate the display. Lower trim levels didn’t always have a display. So the GPS was a big deal option. Today we had to buy the top-trim level to get a GPS because most people don’t need it. All trim levels have a display, but most people connect their smart phone to the display and navigate with their phone. We’re to cheap to get phones with data plans, so we “had” to get a car with all the fancy trimmings. (So sad!)
Our new car is a hybrid, getting over 40 MPG. It has a continuously variable transmission (no gear shifts). There is no shift lever. Instead, there are buttons on the center console for drive, reverse, and park. Even the parking brake is set with a button on the side panel.
The safety features are mind blowing. We barely got a chance to check them out on our test drive. I turned on the blinker when there was a car in my blind spot. I immediately got a pleasant chime warning. Whenever a car was passing us on the right, an icon of a car showed up in the mirror. There’s also lane keeping, adaptive cruise control, emergency automatic braking, and much, much more.
What the car doesn’t have is a CD player. What will I do with all those music CDs?
The internet has made car research a breeze. Before we visited the dealer, I knew which car, which color, which trim level and options, and what I should pay. The dealer gave us a good price on the new car, but not such a great deal on the trade in. So I sold the old Honda to Car Max. I had an electronic estimate from the internet. The dealer said they couldn’t match it. Car Max gave me the full amount without discussion. The only problem was how long I had to wait at Car Max. In fact buying the new car wasn’t very fast either. We spent 2 hours at Honda and another 4 hours at Car Max. We had an early lunch and a late dinner. But as it turned out, we had a neighborhood food truck to serve us festive tacos. The whole neighborhood got to help us celebrate the new car.
I hope this finds everybody doing well.